Bitcoin Forum

Nice video from the Bitcoin 2013 conference :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7LQu-eIOO0

This is a great presentation.

DEFINITELY worth the watch.. man  very good presentation.

Glad you like it!

Should there be any questions, I'm happy to answer them.

Very interesting presentation, thanks for sharing :)

You are T. Demeester? I wasn't expecting you to be quite so... Junior  ;)

Excellent presentation all the same, thanks for your efforts to promote Bitcoin as the way forward.

I love the graphs around 29:38 in the presentation.  Who does not want to see BTC rise to 500,000! 

Question, you mention the "Shadow Economy" using BTC could cause the price to $160,000.  Do you think the problems with Liberty Reserve could indeed spur this on sooner, rather than later?  Personally, I am not sure I am too excited about making profit from questionable underground activity, but I am curious nonetheless.

I think LR crackdown fits in the pattern of the 'hunt for the rich' and 'no more money laundering' (crackdown on offshore banking), and 'let everyone pay its fair share' that we are seeing lately. I don't think governments have all of the sudden grown a conscience, I just think they're rather desperate for money these days. And so they try to raise money whichever way they can, not very successfully.

Consequence is a growth of the 'black engine':
- state workers get lower wages and thus become more bribable
- supervision can become less strict because of lay offs in the government
- increasingly insecure environment for the 'white' / 'official' businesses
- high unemployment caused by higher taxation/more bureaucracy/higher frugality    

That's the bigger picture that I'm seeing. The more the 'shadow banking' sector is under attack and the stronger the trend from cash to mobile becomes, the more I see decentralized cryptocurrencies gain traction in the world of informal trade.

I watched this last night and it was easily the best talk from the conference that I have watched so far. Great job!

Yes, I should post more on the forum, I know  ;)

wow, amazing presentation. one of the best i have ever seen regarding bitcoin.

i am getting a bitcoin start-up going. we plan launching in october. we had talks to german vc already, they showed interest. is it possible to book you for an launching event for giving such a presentation? how much do you charge ? (you can pm me)

i am impressed.

Great talk.

I've always thought that the part of my brain that instantly resonated with Bitcoin was the part that grew up in the Argentina of the 1970s to 1990s... we have a leg up when it comes to a deep understanding of money that others, like Americans, are only now coming to terms with.

Best presentation from the Bitcoin conference! Appreciate the in-depth analysis from a fellow investor's perspective.

Until we can work for Bitcoins there will be problems with people unable to spend them. So what has to be implemented so that anyone can work for Bitcoins?

I think a rise to $500,000 is unrealistic. $50,000 is probably the max we will see before something else comes along to replace Bitcoin. It takes a long time for market cap to rise that much.

Great presentation!

May I make a voice translation of this video for Russian users?

Of course! Perhaps you can post the link in this thread once you're finished.

I work for bitcoins.  If you are an independent contractor, often all you have to do is ask.  If you aren't an independent contractor, I'm sorry.

Watched the talk a couple of days ago. Very cool to see a prominent Belgian proponent.

This has also been my experience. It usually only takes 5 minutes of talking after a Mexican, Argentinian, or Russian 'gets' what the real advantages of Bitcoin are. It's also striking how many bitcointrepreneurs have roots in eastern Europe for example (Romania, Slovenia, Ukrain, Russia) - I don't think this is a coincidence. There is a lot more Bitcoin inertia in Europe and the US.

My understanding towards your speech is that every time there is a bail-in action someplace in the world, the demand for bitcoin will soar and so as the bitcoin price. If another bail-in happens in some major western country (such as France), the bitcoin price may go to a level beyond our wildest imagination. Is that correct?

I think that wouldn't be an unreasonable expectation. Bitcoin has similar fundamental underpinnings as precious metals have: its qualities of liquidity, divisibility, ease of transport, ease of storage, and nonconfiscatability make it a near perfect safe haven asset in times of crisis.

Of course the bottleneck effects that we see whenever there's a surge in Bitcoin interest are still at play. Those will likely create temporary panics which then result in sell offs - such as the ones we've seen in 2011 and earlier this year. 

In other words, while every new bail-in will potentially function as an afterburner for price the price of Bitcoin, we can expect a rocky ride ahead. Volatility will be the name of the game for the foreseeable future - but long term I expect much higher prices.   

Unfortunately, the rise of Bitcoin due to this effect (not others) is somewhat tied to the decline of the US dollar as a repository of value, and that's not likely to happen the way it should because the US government has quite literally the big guns.

We saw this in Cyprus, where there was a rise in Bitcoin prices but there was also a significant (and as it turns out a bit more long lasting) rise in the value of the US dollar.

Now, the day someone decides to start trading oil in BTC instead of USD, then it's fasten your seatbelts time  :D