Bitcoin Forum

Do most bitcoin users actually think that bitcoin is going to 'replace other currency, ATMs on every street corner', etc. at some point in the future? Is such a future actually necessary for bitcoin's continued success or maintainance?

I personally think that such a view is not realistic, but I like bitcoin because I believe in the concept, so I will continue to use bitcoin on some occasions. Is the view I mentioned the general consensus of users that use bitcoin, or just the opinion on a few of what COULD happen? Just want to know people's thoughts..

as web game developer i'm not going to use anything else than bitcoin ever. I dont want to waste my time with banks or other money processors if i can handle money transfers by myself. And do it better, cheaper and faster.

Not saying that it's not useful. But sometimes I see some posts that are like, everyone is going to stop using the dollar and move to bitcoins! I don't really see a majority of the population giving up on fiat.

It could replace paypal. That makes it interesting enough. Plus, it's minable, which is amazing.

The simplest transaction occurs face-to-face where one person physically hands another person some money in exchange for something else.  In the absence of electricity and connected devices there is no (easy) way to do face-to-face bitcoin transactions.  Online transactions are just virtual representations of the simple transaction.  Most people do not want to clutter their daily lives with exchange rates and multiple currencies.  Since they will always need to have currency for the simple face-to-face transactions, and they can use the same currency for online transactions, there is very good motivation to stick to that currency.  Aside from some evangelical bitcoiners, people will continue to use fiat currencies as their base of operation AND their frame of reference until bitcoins can be made to work for those simple real-world transactions.

I think QR codes are easy. 

Cash register has a QR code. I scan and pay. The hyperfast bitcoin network of the future verifies the payment.  That was easy. I didn't have to touch filthy disease-laden cash or remember any passwords.  I pressed a button, typed in the amount, and the cash register rings.  It's a germophobe's dream!

you prob want to have a password then, just sayin

No.

I don't know if other people will use it everyday for basic purchases, I just know that I will.

Not because of bitcoin fiat is dead because the world is tired of greedy backstabbing control freaks.  Things are moving most people don't know about.  They few are not going to be allowed to control everyone much longer.

I am convinced some kind of crypto currency will be the world-wide currency in the future. However, if that is Bitcoin or some world-government backed currency in the future, I don't know.

not in my lifetime..
but i am an old fart.

Physical coins have a real edge..

Potentially some trusted source, like Government, could make physical coins equivalent to their own cryptocurrency.. stamping them with a unique number.

Most likely Bitcoin will become an established parallel and perhaps in a couple of decades once it's confirmed itself, then we'll be born with an amount of BTC to our name and utopia will naturally follow.. it's all good ;)

I don't think so, but it doesn't need to. Email didn't completely replace written/printed letters ;)

They could also give out banknotes that are backed up by Bitcoins lol
All they would need to do is printing notes with Bitcoin adresses without private keys, but the right to claim them for this banknote somewhere.

Bitcoin could really make online as well as person 2 person transaction very easy and practical.

example: If you are with a friend and want to remit 213 dollars, this is impractical since your friend does not accept credit cards.

that amount of cash isn't prohibitive but nobody thinks it is smart to carry that much around, your friend ultimately wants this in their account and may tolerate paypal, but doesn't really want to, because it will take 3 days before it gets anywhere they can actually use, and the "abnormal transaction" might freeze their paypal account since they dont use it regularly.

As long as I can use bitcoin for what I need to use and leave government currency behind that is all I care about. If other people use it or not, that is up to them.

I can already use bitcoin for about 80% of what I spend on.

You don't think people will give up on fiat? The problem is, when fiat enters hyperinflation, people don't have a choice.

We live in an interesting time where the worlds' major fiat currencies are being printed at an alarming rate. And by alarming, I mean - look at the freakin' graph. That the USD and JPY haven't seen hyperinflation yet is astounding. The current rate of printing means that either (1) they will stop printing and the economy will crash and fiat will die, or (2) they will continue printing up until a point that triggers a hyperinflation event, the economy will still crash, and fiat will be just as dead. It isn't a question of waiting for QE to work - QE doesn't work. It's a last-resort tactic that can only end badly.

What's being done right now and for the recent past is a Keynesian experiment. Don't assume fiat will continue to be stable just because it's been that way for most of your life. Tunnel vision etc.

That being said, bitcoin's future could be anyone's guess. There are numerous possibilities -
- A future world with a combination of local currencies, barter, real bills systems, precious metals, localized freeconomies, resource-based economies, and assorted cryptocoins.
Look through history and you will find examples of local currencies, precious metals, barter economies, and even on a smaller scale, tribal and village economies. Fiat was a nice experiment in state domination and its result was that Satoshi invented bitcoin to get us back on track ;D

Oh yeah, and what Elwar said. In the end, what matters to me is that I can use Bitcoin for many of the things I wish to purchase, which I can.

While I don't think that Bitcoin is ever going to exclusively exist as money, and that some form of fiat currency will continue to exist pretty much everywhere on Earth; I do think that Bitcoin (or it's successor) has the potential to become the world's next global reserve currency.  I can't envision a future wherein international trade is likely to return to any kind of gold standard; too many problems with letters-of-credit and such that Bitcoin solves natively.  In two generations, banknotes with the promise of "backing" by Bitcoin reserves will be common enough as well.  The age of paper fiat currencies is fading away, but it will take many generations before fiat is no longer dominate.

If a magic man approached me today and told me "Yes BTC will prosper as long as whatever fiat you choose." I would dump every penny today.

Most currency is already electronic in nature. Trading in pieces of paper really declined a generation ago. I can imagine a time when a “one world” electronic funds transfer system exists that is controlled by no political system, relies on no governments backing and is used as a standard transfer of wealth between nation states.  Bitcoin or some successor would fulfill that role nicely. I don’t believe Bitcoin is well suited for the “man in the street” to use as his daily currency system (like fiat) but it definitely has a purpose. It has been fun being a part of this experiment nonetheless.

No..and it doesn't need to. The reality of the situation is that if a very small percentage of the world thinks "Hey..I think I want to use or hold a bitcoin" then we're moving multiple orders of magnitude higher.

What happens if 12 million people each want 1 bitcoin?

Then
1 Bitcoin = 1 Ferrari
It's that simple. ;)

Short Answer: Not much.

No, and no. Arguably Bitcoin is already a great success for the people it appeals to, and it could very well always remain a niche, or subculture. There is no need for it to replace anything to be successful. It can just add to the world. It's not a zero sum game...

Your question is a bit like asking "Will Linux ever replace every computer operating system in the world"? Sure, with web servers (and later Android) it made a great paces toward large share of the computational devices on the world, but it hasn't replaced anything.

In for an inch, in for a mile. The future has no room for inefficient media of exchange and unreliable stores of value.

Then the scam becomes evident.

How badly do those 12 million want 1 bitcoin?  Who wants it more, and what are they willing to trade for it?  If they want it more than they want $.01, but not more than they want $1, then the price of btc will be less than $1.

I don't see why not. It's really a question of what can outlast what. If you think Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency technology that doesn't depend on any one entity, which can be adjusted, fixed, and changed as it evolves, can outlast fiat that depends on a country's economy and politicians, and is the main thing that allows governments to borrow unlimited amounts of money, then what will happen is that as each government fiat crashes, that country will switch to something else. It could be another government's currency, or it could be Bitcoin. Eventually, as all other government currencies crash and get screwed up, more and more people will move to Bitcoin instead. We're talking very very long term here (even centuries maybe), and likely by then Bitcoin will look completely different from what it is now.

In short, though:
Bitcoin is an idea that is backed by the interest of it's users, who's incentives for it are that it can't be screwed with or destroyed (that's what gives it value).
Government fiat is an idea that is backed by the interest of it's users, who's incentives are to continue to vote for government programs that government can't afford, and continue to print more and more of the currency to reduce the debts of the borrowed money.

Bitcoin simply has a more stable foundation and incentive structure, and thus is more likely to keep swallowing other money up.

EDIT: And if you say something like, "Bitcoin can never be real money, because it fluctuates too much, and you have to wait 10 minutes for transactions," you're an idiot. Currency fluctuation is directly related to how large the currency base is, and technology changes. It's like saying e-mail can never succeed because dialup modems take too long to connect to AOL, and it can only ever be checked at home on PCs.

If we have swarm clients then yes. And we will at some point. So yes.

Bitcoin won't replace fiat just like credit cards haven't replaced cash and PayPal hasn't replaced credit cards. Bitcoin will eventually supplement existing currencies.

Bitcoin will probably replace Western Union and the like, however.

BTW, if Bitcoin becomes more prevalent, more users will be earning their wages or selling goods for BTC so I think there will be even LESS need for Bitcoin ATMs, etc.

Absolutely commonsensical response. Why more people don't realize this is beyond me. Stop preaching about the bitcoin of the future and starting using the bitcoin of today.

... what is this "bitcoin concept" you speak of? Seems like lots of people are ascribing all kinds of wishes, whims and political wonders to a networking protocol.

We are going all the way baby ... govt. fiat is dead because that is how money works, the market will decide.

Just ask yourself keeping in mind that money is fundamentally a value information technology, would you rather hold the money issued and managed by politicians, bureaucrats and banksters or the money managed by a collective consensus of programmers, cryptographers, mathematicians and IT (information technology) technicians?

I completely agree with this statement.  Although I think it's a bit of a reach (okay more than a bit of a reach) to think Bitcoin would replace the dollar or any other national currency, I do think it has opened a Pandora's box of sorts that will never be closed again.  I think that possibility of it replacing high-fee electronic transfer systems is more likely, as is those systems trying to implement Bitcoin in a way that is more beneficial to them than working with the traditional banks.  I think this could be the case for Paypal, Western Union, and other similar companies who have already expressed at least some interest.

I suspect that any particular crypto-currency is more likely than not to succumb the the same sorts of pressures and corruption that most forms of wealth fall victim to.  This is likely especially true for Bitcoin as it was not really designed with defenses against most of these things in mind.  It will happen at an accelerated rate relative to other vehicles due to it's outstanding mobility characteristics.

On the bright side, the corrosive effects could still could take many years to fully metastasize depending on various struggles which are currently underway.  I am much more optimistic about the 'general solution' of distributed crypto-currencies which I feel has the potential to be a lasting game-changer for human civilizations.  The world may never look quite the same!

The main difference between Bitcoin and things like gold, property, etc is that I personally happened to have been in the right place at the right time to get my foot in the door.  And a big chunk of my lower leg for that matter.  Long live Bitcoin!

You are comparing currencies to technologies. Sure, Maestro Cards didn't replace paper Euro notes, but paper Euro notes replaced Italian paper Lira notes, for example. Bitcoin may not replace credit cards, either, but that doesn't mean we can't end up with a Bitcoin denominated credit card that replaced dollar and euro credit cards.


Can you elaborate please? Government and private issued currencies fall due to the issuer falling. Bitcoin has no issuer. Gold and other "hard" currencies fall because they are difficult to store and transact with, and the places trusted to store them end up either succumbing to fractional reserve or to the currency being diluted (like with tungsten found in gold bars). Bitcoin is easy to store and transact on people's personal walkers. So what kinds of pressures and corruption do you have in mind?

Regarding the OP, and the couple of replies after mine, ignoring my point, it's not "Can it replace...?" it's "Can it outlast...?" Do you guys believe Bitcoin can outlast government fiat currencies? If yes, why can't it supplant and replace them?

Think of it as an opposition party to the fiats, it may never get elected to the office, but it must exist and get funded.

That's exactly right. Unless Bitcoin fails national currencies can not survive.

Holding government-issued currencies means a guaranteed loss of purchasing power. The only reason people hold on to it is because the alternatives are riskier or have other downsides.

If Bitcoin continues to develop and grow, at time point it will represent a safer alternative to legacy currencies and then the era of government-issued money will be over.

Someone mentioned printing money as the main cause of inflation.  Banks create most inflation, creating new money through their 10x multiplier on loans giving interest....  I don't think this could happen with bitcoin.

Uggg.  In a nutshell:


   Wealth -->  Power --
      ^                |
      |                |
       ---------------


It's a vicious cycle with never ends well.

I think bitcoin is going to replace most currencies on the internet, at least (because it's far simpler and cheaper)

I also think the internet is going to eventually replace or disrupt a lot of older, offline technology and businesses (fair bet; already happening)

So when you put the two together, it's not really that much of a stretch to say that bitcoin will displace or disrupt a large amount of existing financial infrastructure. Talking in absolutes is naive.

Since that same cycle is usually only disrupted by revolutionary events, whether or not it ends "well" or not very much depends upon who's back is up against the wall at that time.

It's usually not desirable to have revolutions unless they are necessary.  Usually they involve bloodshed which is unpredictable distributed.  But ya, that's what I alluding to by 'never ends well.'

One of my long-standing hopes for distributed crypto-currencies are that they can make the process of separating the wealthy from their wealth a bit less unpleasant for everyone involved.

I did actually mean elaborate, not summarize. I know that wealth leads to power and power leads to wealth, but how can that lead to pressure and corruption that results in Bitcoin (or bitcoin holders) being the victim? Isn't the whole point of Bitcoin that you are in control, and are not at the mercy or whims of someone corrupt and powerful?

It's not my interest to formulate a treatise on my political and economic philosophies for this thread at this time.

The OP seems to indicate that his/her goal was to do something of a survey of attitudes and postures within the 'Bitcoin community'.  My hope in responding was mostly to illustrate that as a community we are not without some diversity.