Bitcoin Forum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgDsyj5eLmo

"Bankrupt By Beanies"

Like the gentleman in the video, you all thought you found a sure thing. And now you watch as the value goes lower, lower, and even lower. Eventually, when there's no hope of recouping your losses for the foreseeable future, you'll tell yourselves that... "Maybe someday bitcoin will become popular again!" just like his wife in this video.

Lesson number one in investing: if you've found something that seems too good to be true, it is. Somebody made money on bitcoin, but it's at your expense. Those people found out about bitcoin very early and marketed by telling you that it would change the world, and all you needed to do was buy, hold, and sell no matter what.

In 10 more years, maybe there will be a documentary about some of the people here. At least the guy in this video still has all his stuffed animals to show for his financial failures.

Really painful to watch for the second time...  :(

Chuckee - Registered August 16, 2014, 06:56:52 PM

Its amazing watching the same shit play out every freaking year on this forum. I've seen the same posts by the latest noob troll over and over and over.

Hilarious isn't it?

It's not going to happen to you if you don't invest more than you can afford to lose. That's all.

he should have diversified
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgRds44m1kI

So basically:

Bitcoin = Beanie Babies

Dogecoin = Digital gold

Beanie Babies and PEZ aren't anything like the technology behind Bitcoin. Not to say that Bitcoin can't fail, but it won't fail because of any similarity to some collectible toy.

Nah, Bitcoin is more like Scotch or fine wine. Let it age and grow in value and flavor.

Ad hominem attacks just show us you don't have any arguments.

The argument here isn't an ad hominem. The argument, if you want a catchy name, is perhaps best called 'extrapolation from pattern'.

Which you can reasonably find questionable still (after all, the 'bubble, crash, next bubble' pattern has only been on for ~3 years - which depending on your perspective is either an eternity or nothing), but at least give the NamelessOne credit as to what his argument actually is based on.

The OP didn't have any arguments either.

Also if bitcoins are beanie babies what should we call deposits in Cypriot banks?

Wow, this guy really nailed the beanie babies bitcoin connection
http://quantiger.wordpress.com/2012/09/17/the-future-of-bitcoin-my-predictions/

in 2012 ;) I hope he's rich.

Yes, bitcoin's value is partly speculative, but comparing a stuffed toy to the first peer to peer open source money/banking system? That's hysterical. Also, you address your post to everyone saying someone else made money on bitcoin, but it wasn't you. Posting that on bitcointalk is pretty odd, considering most of the people who have made money on bitcoin hang out here.

The important thing to keep in mind is: If you followed rule number 1 in investing/trading ("never invest more than you are afford to lose") you'll be fine no matter what happens.

Agreed.

The article is hilarious shit eheh.

That was a really cool youtube video though, thanks!

Could be a false equivalence, as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence

The problem with the fallacy classification is that it is circular to a degree, or perhaps more accurately: they only describe the structure of an argument, but doesn't answer conclusively if, in the given context, the argument is valid or not. People however tend to use the term fallacy to mean "your argument is wrong".

"Ad hominem" is a good example: depending on the circumstances, an ad hominem can be evidence that an argument is not valid ("We should lower taxes because of X". "No we shouldn't, you cheated on your wife!"), or it can be a reasonable objection given the right context ("We should forbid gay marriage. Only the marriage between man and woman is free of sin." "Oh really. So how come you cheated on your wife?")

I get your point, but, actually, even that example's retort is a fallacy, because the person arguing for marriage between a man and a woman is arguing that only the act itself of getting married in a different context involves sin, not that a separate sin can't be committed while a man and woman are married. In other words, that retort is no different than "Oh, really. So how come you murdered someone while you were married to your wife?")

How can you compare the usefulness of 'Beanies' with that of bitcoin? Insanity.

Sidenote: this is heavily offtopic of course. But since OP opened a rather worthless thread, I don't feel bad for hijacking it :D


I get your point as well, however:

What you describe would be true in a sort of platonic realm of arguments, where each proponent of a position would be completely unrelated on a personal level from the position he or she presents. Let's say, how a mathematician would present a proof. He could be wrong, he could be right, but there is only the validity of the argument itself, and it has no relation to the individual presenting it other than that the person presenting the proof contains the brain that computed the proof (or made an error doing so).

I believe that, even in principle, that's not how non-mathematical arguments work. There is no "platonic ideal" of, say, the right amount of taxation. Or whether it is morally wrong or right to marry man and woman only, or man, man goat.

So my claim is: even when we can make some references to more abstract, possibly objective points in an (moral) argument, we will also inevitably invoke some personal aspects. Like "personal integrity", or "consistency of principles of ones own life".

And it is at this point, if there is a clear contradiction between one of the claims of the argument (say: "marriage is holy") and the personal example of the proponent of the argument (say: he cheats on his wife) that an ad hominem is a valid counter - not because it goes against any principle that the proponent of the argument mentions, but because the proponent inevitable has to rely on personal aspects to further his argument (in the case of moral/aesthetical/maybe also economical arguments).

Does that make any sense?

Bitcoin isn't useful, aside from speculating, day trading, and online gambling. People aren't using bitcoins to buy things online, unless they already had some to begin with! What we're seeing now is a domino effect of investors losing faith, one by one, because merchant adoption has finally happened, but the general public still doesn't care!

When the price stops rallying up, there's nothing left to look forward to anymore!

People bought beanies because they were told they were sure to rise in value.

People bought bitcoin because they were told they were sure to rise in value.

IT'S.THE.SAME.THING!

That's fair enough. We see a lot of these trolls come and go. But I thought this line was pretty hilarious in the context of beanie babies... "Maybe someday bitcoin will become popular again!"

LOL.... ;D

Ah, the old 'moving goal post' maneuver...

Let's go back 1 year or so: "Merchants will never adopt Bitcoin. They have no incentive to do so!"

Today: "Okay, so quite a few merchants accept Bitcoin, and Bitpay/Coinbase make it possible to pay with Bitcoin even if a merchant doesn't accept them yet, but customers will never adopt them because they have no incentive to do so!

We'll see. Next likely step before customer adoption: merchants giving those incentives to pay in Bitcoin, effectively splitting the gains from lower transactions cost with customers in the form of rebates.

Lets be honest here.  Merchants dont accept bitcoin.  They have to be converted by a middleman like Coinbase

As a customer.  Unless you already have btcs from the easy mining days.  Why would you want go through an extra step to buy something w btcs

Merchants only began to accept bitcoin (through third party processors) because the holders BEGGED them to, since they mistakenly believed that would validate their currency and cause it to rise in value. Merchants couldn't be more happy to oblige... how often do you have potential customers begging you to take their money?

Still, some people here seem to think that the very fact that they accept bitcoin means it is now mainstream, or will be soon. It's not, it's just merchants capitalizing on the fad. The above poster is correct: there is no incentive for regular people to buy bitcoins to then turn around and spend them.

"Hey, [insert your name]! Teach me how to buy bitcoins please! I want to get some so I can then turn around and buy stuff on Overstock.com." -- Nobody, ever.

You know, this, hmm, kinda hard to understand for me. I mean, it kinda looks like you have experience argueing about those interspecies relations.
Your avatar is more than just a reference from a comic?

I could tolerate the Tulip comparison but this Beanie baby comparison is crossing the line!  You choose to completely ignore anything good about Bitcoin and compare it to an addiction of hoarding stuffed animals.  I won't bother to argue why you're wrong because you didn't bother to explain why your right.  ;)

Bitcoin is a novel experiment and the public ledger is very clever, however it solves a problem that people don't have.

1) People in the developed world have stable currencies, and even if they're concerned about the economy, they can invest in precious metals or foreign currencies. Why buy into bitcoin, which is susceptible to hacks or data loss? Paper wallets are far too complex for your average "Dancing with the Stars" "X Factor" bag of Doritos Mr. and Mrs. citizen.

2) People in the third world who live under unstable economies don't give a shit about bitcoin. They have nothing to save... they live day to day so inflation doesn't mean much to them. Even if they do have money to save, they'll use it to buy foreign currencies or again, precious metals.

We all appreciate bitcoin and think it's wonderful, but if nobody really has a use for it, then it's no better than a beanie baby doll.

Guess you only skimmed my post, so you could slap your sloppily formulated objection to the end of it. Otherwise, you would have noticed that I mentioned the difference between "companies accepting Bitcoin" and going through a payment provider myself. Some of the companies accept BTC natively, some through one of the payment providers. Really doesn't matter for the end user though: you get to pay with Bitcoin, which is what people asked for. Here's a partial list:

Overstock, Expedia, Newegg, VirginGalactic, Gyft.com, CheapAir.com, TigerDirect, Dish, Dell.

Oh, right, food delivery by thuisbezorgd. Pretty big in the Netherlands.

And about the second point ("customers don't have an incentive to use it")... see above. Already answered to that in the first line. Look up 'moving goalpost' if you need to.

And you are on this forum why? To educate about a technology you see no use for? Yes, very wise use of your time. Glad you have such lofty goals for your existence.

Um right, last year the Winklevii invested $12M in beanie babies.  Just recently Tim Draper invested $27M in beanie babies.  Last year Silicon Valley invested over $100M in beanie baby startups.  Millions of $$ in seed funds keep getting poured into new beanie baby exchanges and beanie baby mining operations.

To the OP I say:

http://cdn01.cdnwp.celebuzz.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/14/jennifer-lawrence-10.gif

Because he wants all the beanie babies to himself that's why! Oh no these precious bears, nobody giveth them for free so Chuckee can't haz them all.

I go cry now. We poor bagholders, holding a bag of money is hard but I'll struggle alone thanks.

In the speculation and securities world, there is something called emotion...this plays a very HUGE factor in determining "investor sentiment". If you are new to this "sport" and you
don't understand behavioral science and how mind games work, you are very vulnerable to manipulation. Yes, you can manipulate prices directly by pump and dumps, TA intervention if you can
forecast what the majority of traders may do and preempt it...or indirectly by monkeying with individual "investor's" mindset. This can work to either to raise or drop prices. Do not underestimate
the power of "opinion shaping". I have noticed certain posters (there is more than one and some with more than one account) on this forum who are very much practicing this "art". When
you've been in this game long enough, you can easily smell most of them like stink on shit...however, there are a smaller number of them who are very good at it and hard to detect. They can goose and subvert the
overall sentiment quite easily on the forums. One of the simplest method and there are several, is the ruse that they are a "believer" so suspicion is lifted. They will then subtly inject negative "information" while they are simultaneously posting positive "information" but using the least relevant ones. Once their infiltration is complete and reinforced, subversion is magnitudes simpler.

When there's a gold rush, invest in shovels  ;D Tim Draper is an idiot and is already kicking himself for his loss.

The Winklevii came out way ahead no matter how you look at it, so they're part of the fortunate elite. Everyone else is investing in the bitcoin services, not bitcoin itself.

Not the beanies shit AGAIN.
>Muh beanies, it compares to EVERYTHING, even to disruptive technology

Give me a fucking break boy. Will bump thread in a year.

Even the infrastucture VCs got to be sweating now.  Marc Andreesen invested like 25M in Coinbase and Overstock only did 1.6 M of sales first 2 quarters.  How much did Coinbase make from that? 2%?    That only 16K.  Imagine their cash burn and recent reports of late payments.   If that series b funding runs out its kaput for Coinbase

Well, this is the real catch -- what is their risk appetite? If we dropped below $400 then the rationale of cutting losses may very well overcome the sunk cost fallacy. It's tough to know. They have to be sweating, but their sweat may actually be bullish -- when pushed they might actually double down. It remains to be seen.

One year from now, when BTC is trading in the 200-400 dollar range, the bulltards and cultists will still loudly exclaim that BTC is just temporarily below the exponential "trend line", and that the next bull market is just a couple of weeks away.

See tech bubble 1.0 and 2.0... smart people have historically invested their money in some incredibly stupid s---. It happens. Remember that not every dollar they are investing is from their personal stash, a lot of their pay is based on commission, it's popular and they need to sell it, it is always easier to sell an idea after it is no longer profitable to buy it (after a bubble has peaked), and their is also the ego satisfaction part of it. People forget that Marc Andressen went completely broke for a while with a med based online start up -- that I think eventually morphed into WebMD -- because he was on a hot streak and the shock to his bank account should it drown was less important to him than the shock of being outside the spotlight. That itself is bullish... at least some of these captains are willing to go down with the ship. But this whole concept that... oh these guys invested so much in infrastructure so it has to go somewhere... nuh uh.

Also see fiber optic cable infrastructure development -- something of great common utility that bankrupted a lot of the titans that made laying it possible. It is entirely possible that Bitcoin investors are sacrificial lambs to a brighter future. That definitely happens in the sphere of innovation.

For many of us, Bitcoin would have to go below $20 to start losing any money.

And I'm still buying BTC at $400 levels.

Let me play your game for a moment.  Here is a link to your video at 5:26.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgDsyj5eLmo#t=326  Watch for 5 seconds.  This is what went wrong with Beanie Babies.  It was the point when Dogecoin decided to switch to an infinite number of coins.  Bitcoin will only ever have a maximum of 21 million coins.  There is no Bitcoin, Inc. waiting to turn out the next batch.  Beanie Babies lost its capability as a store of value when the manufacturer pumped up production.  Value became diluted, investors pulled out, and the bean bag holders were left with worthless product.  Do not confuse this with an item that has limited quantity, guaranteed by mathematics.

Infinitely divisible, bro. In theory there are 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000... coins out there. Infinitely divisible. Effectively, however, keeping a fixed number of coins does at least provide a psychological peg so that's good.

Why did nobody think to gut the beanie babies and sell the individual beans instead? Pure genius!

Bingo. We've got a winner.

Not sure if you watch the news or not but scams and hacks aren't only an issue for Bitcoin, for example Target being hacked and the loss of customers data.  Problems like this are only going to get worse and that is why Bitcoin exists as an alternative.   If your trying to say Bitcoin isn't safe then your mistaken, you and I both know the average person doesn't have a clue how the Banking system works so that doesn't change a thing.  As long as they understand the basics of what not to do they would be fine, the problem is their used to having someone else do everything for them.  Because Bitcoin is a new approach to banking their is expected to be pullback but not people burying their heads in the sand for reason.  The more work involved is well worth it when you look at the big picture.

People in the third world aren't worried about Bitcoin your very right but if the need silver and gold they have a need for Bitcoin.  Maybe not right away but who knows if that will be so in the future and I doubt people in the third world like others speaking for them. If your trying to say Bitcoin isn't safe then your mistaken and the development of the BTC would only make it more accessible to people who don't understand how it works but would like to use it. 

Actually the YT link was pretty good. I enjoyed watching that mini-documentary.

The beanie baby dad had a bit of a Heisenberg look to him... Breaking Beanies.

I'd say there are some parallels to Bitcoin in that the market ultimately decides value and the market is unpredictable. That said, Bitcoin was engineered to have highly desirable and useful properties to enable secure and efficient transfer of value over digital networks. Something that can't be said of Beanie Babies which merely have a novelty or collector value. Still, as we've seen with Dogecoin and others, human psychology plays a huge part in how things ultimately unfold.

When you divide a Bitcoin, it's like a stock split.  It becomes worth that much more.  This is not the same thing as turning on the printing presses and creating more fiat; not by a long-shot.

Do I have to reply properly from a brand new account or is it ok using my current one?

You guys badly need new people here, to give you insight into what real people think about bitcoin, not the same 20 bull-tards who post the same garbage in here day after day. Of course, there aren't many new users, because hardly anyone is interested in bitcoin anymore. Meanwhile, every day, ~3600 coins are still being created, and Coinbase and Bitpay continue to cash out their holdings.

Know anything about supply and demand and its effects on prices?

Everyday adoption increases, new wallets are generated and the public becomes more aware of bitcoin. If you're worried about the purchasing power of bitcoin, just give it time.

There are less mindless speculators hoping to get rich, and this is a good thing.

Actual users, however, are increasing, but that doesn't bubble the price up as much.

And permabulls and big investors are playing the long game. Still gambling, sure. But if you don't see the potential of Bitcoin you're, well, not even an idiot, rather you are just the average Joe who doesn't look much beyond his next paycheck.

That's always the result of investing in anything that can be mass produced

Aye... a lot of capital is going into spreading FUD on this forum.

As if FUD on this forum affects anyone's buying decisions but a bunch of newbies with 10 dollars each :) I guess these money would be much better spent on some highly regarded professors bashing bitcoin in financial media, claiming it will go below $10 soon. Oh wait...

I know, right?  Why do these troll traders/shorts not realize that just by looking at this sub forum's view count, the people that come here and read only constitute barely 0.1% of the overall worldwide bitcoin holders?  Possibly even much less.  Meaning that, none of their trolling posts will have any significant effect on the majority of bitcoins holders buying & selling decisions.  At all.

Can't they even do simple math?

Bearish users are always so catastrophic about their predictions, almost like the bullish dreaming of bitcoins valued at millions of dollars.

good video.
but the fate is in your own hands

I like how you said almost..  Because we all know they bears screaming the price is falling everyday is just insanity and those that think Bitcoin will be so high are basically wishful thinking or complete geniuses lol.

Totally retarded argument, wrong comparation, objectively speaking.

But, does it affect hodlers?

The number of coins can not actually be infinite, but can only approach it. As when you have an infinitely small piece of bitcoin, the price would be divided by infinity, thus be zero no matter what. Rendering it useless.

Any non-infinite number of bitcoins though would have value, even if the individual pieces have very low value, like a satoshi. They would still be useful in transactions. As you can just send any arbitrary number if bitcoins or fractions thereof to someone. So the value does not really matter all that much.

Bitcoin tokens are only divisible up to the satoshi level, so more or less 2100000000000000 satoshi (2*10^15).

"Infinitely divisible"makes 0 sense.