Bitcoin Forum

https://commerce.microsoft.com/PaymentHub/Help/Right?helppagename=CSV_BitcoinHowTo.htm (https://commerce.microsoft.com/PaymentHub/Help/Right?helppagename=CSV_BitcoinHowTo.htm)

Well how about that. I never would have guessed.

It appears that microsoft is really only accepting bitcoin for their gaming consoles/in game purchases/game subscription purchases and not for their enterprise and software/operating system purchases 

They really accept bitcoin, but for now only for USA  :(
https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/microsoft-now-accepts-bitcoin-bitpay/ (https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/microsoft-now-accepts-bitcoin-bitpay/)

I hope we will see bitcoin price raise up

"You can now use Bitcoin to add money to your Microsoft account. Once you add money to your Microsoft account, you can use it as a payment option to buy apps, games, and other digital content from Windows, Windows Phone, Xbox Games, Xbox Music, or Xbox Video stores."

from https://commerce.microsoft.com/PaymentHub/Help/Right?helppagename=CSV_BitcoinHowTo.htm

...You can’t use bitcoin to purchase Microsoft products and services directly at this time."

AT THIS TIME are the three most important words of the statement.  It is a strong indication that they at least believe that there will be such a time IMO.

ig

so far USA come on MS bring Bitcoin acceptance to the rest of the world too  ;D

I never thought that I'll ever have to admit that MS is doing the right thing. Geeeee....

This is very good news and will probably support a domino-effect for companies still deciding to start accepting BTC.

Next stop: Amazon?

They are not accepting it directly, I think they are using Bitpay but it's a good for them and bitcoin none the less.

Amazon, Google, eBay, Wal-Mart, Auchan, Tesco, Agip/IP, Shell, Q8, Vodafone, what are you waiting for?

It doesn't matter if they convert BTc directly in USD.
What matter, in the long run, is they create demand for BTC because they accept BTC, so people have a reason to accept BTC or request BTC to be able to pay them.

All the boys & girls playing with an X-Box now can top their account as much as they want and can do it without needing to pass by gift cards or their parents credit card.
One step less, one level of control less.

it have to start somewhere, not worldwide but at least they accept it.

This thread (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=889375.0) says it's not true ??

Merchants don't have much choise other than directly converting their Bitcoins to fiat due to the volatility.

There will be a time that they prefer to keep the coins instead of converting, but that won't happen any time soon.

it is bad, that they do not hear you  here:)

That thread is idiotic trolling and nothing more.  It's on the microsoft page, people are taking screen caps.  You can safely believe it at this point.

Parents can reverse unauthorized transactions done by children.
I guess this is one reason why Microsoft is accepting Bitcoin.  ;D

Microsoft gave the middle finger to Apple and their ApplePay by accepting Bitcoin, Amazon will do the same thing to Ebay/Paypal.

Mark my words.  ;)

they are waiting each other, who move first, they follow

Nicely place heading :)

Its only a matter of time before the big ones start accepting Bitcoins. Once a few start taking it will snowball, and we are already seeing that happening.

What an odd sentence, by both BillG and The Register's copy. Having to be physically in the same place as my currency? No, I have a credit card, a debit card, and a personal checkbook, none of which require me to lug around vast quantities of currency. Heck, with a telephone or the internet, I don't even have to be physically in the same place as the business that is selling me their product! Additionally, I know that my 300 units of currency will not drastically change in value between the time I started filling my shopping cart and the time I check out.

Yeah strange times indeed. Google was my first bet this year, but everyone is already making the big step. Maybe Google fears that because they are the internet basically they cannot make a mistake and enter Bitcoin before it is really established as a long term thing.

Google is a smart company, they are waiting the perfect moment... Maybe they are accumulating :/

They ar elikely making their own. They will realise late that they dont have the first mover advantage. For example see google plus.

I wonder if the price of the consoles keeps on changing. I mean you could have 5 btc shown today and tomorrow when btc price goes up, price of console is now 5.2btc. Too bad these are only available in US.

Sounds great, except that I don't have a Microsoft account, and that I've never bought anything from Microsoft. Anyone knows how many people have a Microsoft account, and how many actually do buy things through that account?

Good Move Microsoft!

It will make MS more money.

So MS isn't that shitty after all..

I hope this can be followed by other large companies such as Google, Yahoo and others, due to its bitcoin accepted as payment applications, games and others make the price of the application to be cheaper than when the application is paid wear fiat currency ...  ::)

with more and more large companies such as Microsoft, Google and Yahoo in accepting bitcoin as a means of payment applications, games, etc., then I hope bitcoin prices will further increase, due to the use bitcoin more and more so that the collector bitcoin will think twice when it will sell bitcoin ...  ::)

who cares for MS to use BTC not fully tho. Google are accepting it in some parts but they are testing the water before going public and making it fully functional to buy all products and services with. Indeed as som eone said waiting on perfect moment to go live with it. in terms of them grabbing bitcoin more than possible they are grabbing some for the future and testing to make progress with. Never know google might come out  with their own wallet system like google check out service.

What about  apple ? I  think that they will never accept bitcoin as method of payment *they have applpay*.

apple maybe in the  future but they like their own expensive crap and apple I hate their just over priced junk and a fashion statement and can get far better products.

Honestly what does Google do is a big puzzle for me. There are surely many people familiar with bitcoin who work there, I'm pretty sure that some of their technical employees also hold some coins. If they wanted, they would already be in, by buying coins, or more probably, some btc startup. They clearly do not do that, which means they either think that btc is not gonna make it (which worries me) or they plan on making their own (at which they will probably fail like many times they did).

I agree. Google seem to promote open source technology through their own distribution of AOSP (Android Open Source Project) and their Nexus range of phones are well known as being easy to unlock and install customised firmware.

You'd think that, rather than inventing some kind of GoogleCoin, they'd be embracing Bitcoin in the race to beat Apple's proprietary system.

Google are smart and know that they have to keep up with Apple so why are they so hesitant? It does seem like they have a bad feeling about the success of Bitcoin. Anyone agree?

Apple tends to be more slow moving when it comes to adopting this kind of new technology so I would expect them to likely be one of the last technology companies to accept bitcoin. Plus yes they do have apple pay which somewhat compeates with bitcoin.

I think that MSFT accepting bitcoin on what is essentially a trial run will allow both them and other tech companies to see the benefits of accepting bitcoin. Plus they probably don't trust bitpay enough for them to handle multimillion dollar orders, plus the potential for several hundred million dollars in orders per day could potentially mean that bitpay would offer inferior exchange rates as they would have difficulty exchanging several million dollars worth of bitcoin to fiat

Support for adding money to a Microsoft account with Bitcoin is currently limited to the United States.

Was trying it myself then noticed I am in the great white north I'll look forward to when they expand its borders sigh

I think this works in reverse, as mass merchant adoption equals mass merchant dumps. In the end, merchants need $.

Apple certainly won't accept bitcoin, especially not in the near future. They seem quite serious about their Apple Pay system. Bitcoin is pretty much their enemy right now, i would assume.

Microsoft has taken some VERY strange steps lately. They seem to make some big changes, and i really like them. (open source .NET for example)
Perhaps this move to bitcoin is another step in their big plan to change their stategy.

I can see google taking the step, but then again, i find google quite hard to predict sometimes.

When I see how many Google-employees are trading Bitcoin privately, I wouldn't be surprised if they build a lobby within the company for supporting BTC....

It does not work that way. They have smart people dedicated to looking for trends and technology opportunities, then they make a decision on higher level. I am pretty sure they have already considered it. They just don't see the potential, plan something on their own or do not think that it will fit their business model. Or just wait to see how it goes before making a decision.

Personally, I think that they are trying to snipe some promising startup, just haven't really finalized anything.

Yeah I agree. They must have already considered it. Google is smart.

I think they think like, accepting "Bitcoin" would mean a decline in potential for their Wallet or something. Just guessing.
Let us wait and watch.

Google is the kind of "lets do this ourselves" company

If they come out with another altcoin, it is bound to fail.
Bitcoin is here to stay and they should accept it.

I was particularly surprised that Microsoft accepted Bitcoin this early compared to Google or Apple.

I'm sure Google is contemplating ways to implement or incorporate, but MS jumping into the fray this fast is good on them.

Apple on the other hand has made their own bed with Apple Pay, which they'll probably promote market aggressively to it's sheeple followers until Bitcoin does make a mainstream splash.  Only then, once it's available and easily implemented into Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Amazon's etc interface will Apple eventually jump on the bandwagon.

MS incorporating it is a good start.

They're waiting for Microsoft's Bitcoin test, Microsoft should start to give employees salaries as Bitcoin if they wanna be a pioneer again! That sounds cool  8)

Great news.

I can somewhat see google trying to start a new altcoin however I don't think it would have that great of an incremental advantage over other altcoins just because it was created by google because google would need to stay somewhat uninvolved once it is launched in order for it to remain decentralized.

I think this will be a good opportunity for other tech companies to see how well bitcoin can increase their profitability and to get a real world "test" for bitcoin

What they would do better is integrate their altcoin with all their services.
Of course, nobody should have any expectations of privacy if they use an altcoin designed by google.

This was indeed a very bold move from Microsoft! I'm looking forward to other tech giants following their lead.

I don't see how they could do this. As it stands now bitcoin is very easily integrated into other programs, plus google can potentially simply use off chain transactions in their programs (similar to how coinbase uses off chain transactions)

Privacy is one of the major selling points to getting people to use bitcoin (and altcoins) if an alt designed by google, for google is not going to have privacy features (or has anti-privacy features) then it is unlikely that anyone will want to use it which means it will not have any value

It is a trade off you make - between privacy and convenience.
Using your facebook account to log in is terrible for privacy, but convenient. People still do it.

Do people buy things from Microsoft? hahaha.

Well, yes. 90% of the world PC operating system is using window. So what do you think?

Using a google altcoin would not be any more convenient then using bitcoin. Both would be easily spendable using a computer/smartphone. 

This is not what Microsoft is accepting bitcoin for. They are only accepting it in their xbox store (not for actual xboxs though) although they may expand this in the future

Yeah... I noticed just recently. I checked out the payment options and bitcoin was nowhere to be seen, even though i read articles claiming otherwise. At first i thought it's just because i'm not in the US.

They will. It's just a matter of when. The more time you take to accept bitcoin as a businessman = the more of a dumb idiot you'll be seen as in the future for not having the balls to be a pioneer.

They are trying to match their user base with the user base of bitcoin and accepting bitcoin for those services.

You are probably right. They will probably see that the overall cost of processing the payment is much lower and they will not need to deal with the hassle of things like chargebacks