Bitcoin Forum

Hi I am Looking for somebody to do a short intro to bitcoin, this will be put on the back of a small flyer that me and friends will distribute. I am looking for a kind of fiat vs bitcoin piece. explaining to people why we are are all in the finical mess the world finds itself in today.

I believe that many people just don't understand that the money in there pocket, is really not worth the paper its printed on. (so to speak :P)  so if that could be touched on?

We are very limited on space as it s a small flyer.

If anybody would like to contribute we would be very happy.  ;D

also may be able to give a small tip as well.  :P

Thanks!

Bitcoin is a of yet a decentralized crypto currency that is created via the hashing power of specialized hardware.
The people who use the specialized hardware to create the bitcoins are called "miners" and they "mine" with their equipment.
The difficulty of mining bitcoins increases with each passing day and this leads to bitcoins becoming more scarce and more valuable.
Bitcoins can be used once mined or bought online as frictionless payment without the need of a third party provider such as paypal.
Despite bitcoins being technically cryptographic keys their worth as of now is in the $120 range and increasing by the day.
The value of bitcoins is stored as cryptographic public keys and is as of now within the $120 price range per bitcoin.

That last edit sounds better I think.

tip? ;D

Bitcoin is to money what email was to mail.

Bitcoin is programmable money.

Absorb this for more:
http://m.techcrunch.com/2013/09/10/disrupt-sf-13-bitcoin-panel/

Not bad but I was looking for a more layman intro. For the average no tech people. with more comparison between fiat and BTC.
More like this....

International and decentralised payment processor with built-in scarcity.

I'm sorry but this is terrible.

Most people won't have any idea what you're talking about and the others will think it's a scam.

The term "mining" shouldn't be mentioned more than once near the end, if at all. Here it (and "hashing") appears 5 times in the beginning. See also https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=296674.msg3185191#msg3185191.

Also there is a huge focus on the potential for speculative gains from investment in Bitcoin, at the expense of discussing its actual merits.

I'm thinking of something like, feel free to work on top of that, I haven't really put a lot of effort into it:


Here's bitcoin. It's open source money.

Like other successful open source projects, for example Linux, it's impossible for anyone to take control of it. Banks, the government, Evil Overlords, they have to accept that people use it just the way it works best for them.

Paying with bitcoins is easy. In the blink of an eye you'll be able to send them to anyone anywhere on the planet, no credit card, bank, postal service required. It's just as simple as sending email.

Counterfeiting bitcoins is impossible. Each and every bitcoin is scrutinized not only by you or a bank, but actually by all of the computers on the bitcoin network.

There will never be more than 21 Million bitcoins.
Unlike government issued paper money, noone can ever simply print more and reduce your holdings' value.
That might sound like there's too few of them to be useful, but don't you worry, they can be divided into bitcents and even lower. We won't run out on them.

Take money into your own hands. Use bitcoin.

Thanks for that, this is definitely closer to what we are looking for. We don't want to mention "mining" we feel that the average user dose not need to understand mining, much the same way as the average user of paypal dose not need to understand its mechanisms to use it.

Bitcoin:
In 2009, a big problem was solved- the problem of how to spend cash on the internet.
Bitcoins, instead of being minted by a company or the government, are generated by powerful computers that spend all day verifying and compressing earlier Bitcoin transactions. When a miner figures out how to compress old records, it gets 25 new bitcoins. The computers are called Bitcoin Miners and anyone can buy or build one to connect to the bitcoin network, the most powerful computer network on earth.
To use bitcoins, you need a Wallet. There are dozens of options from Armory to Blockchain.info or Inputs.io. They're all free to use. You can even use your brain as a wallet by memorizing a passphrase that translates into a Keypair.
A Wallet is essentially two long numbers, an Address and Private Key. You can buy second-hand bitcoins on an online or local exchange like Satoshi Square in NYC or Bitstamp, Coinbase or Kraken online.
What this means for online commerce is that middleman companies like Paypal are getting closer to becoming obsolete. There are lots of other implications for the whole world, too.
What's a bitcoin worth? It depends on what someone is willing to pay for one. Coindesk.com has a ticker that tells you current exchange rates based on the online market. They're worth around $130 as of the time of this writing, but have been slightly past $200 in the past. Nobody knows how valuable they might be one day.
Bitcoin is:
P2P, which means that there's no middleman.
Open source, which means anyone can help build the program.
Cryptographically secure, which means that the transactions you make are encoded so nobody can intercept them.
Highly Divisible, instead of having two decimal places, like $1.00, bitcoin has eight, like this: BTC1.000000.
Optional fees, to speed up a transaction, you can pay a fee to a miner, but it usually isn't necessary.
There's lots to bitcoin. Visit bitcointalk.org or bitcoin.org to learn more.

It's important to mention mining. Otherwise it's unclear where they come from.

Bitcoin is freedom
Freedom from arbitrary purchasing restrictions
Freedom from obligated identification
Freedom of independent wealth preservation
Freedom from centralized control
Bitcoin is a revolutionary vehicle to change things for the better: "Instead of trying to change governments with a useless vote, or pathetic pleading, we merely abandon the government's powerbase - the power derived from control of exchange and currency." - Eric voorhees

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Introduction

Ideas from here?
The page is under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license

http://<a href="http://imgur.com/LTW2qh3"><img src="https://i.imgur.com/LTW2qh3.png" title="Hosted by imgur.com" /></a>

1PfRM3YruXN4rt3oy6e7bWS9r69sLSk9zn

https://i.imgur.com/LTW2qh3.png

Hope people can see it this time :-)



1PfRM3YruXN4rt3oy6e7bWS9r69sLSk9zn

Hehe, this one is the best so far.  :D

Bitcoin is an electronic crypto currency that is easy to use.  It provides for a fair amount of anonymity like cash but can be used easily online.  It has low fees compared to something like paypal and is great for very small payments, e.g. less than 1 US cent.  You can easily get started for free, get an online wallet at blockchain.info and some free bitcoins at dailybitcoins.com.

I realize that this is not perfect but I think it is pretty good for a lay audience.  Obviously insert your favorite online wallet and faucet.

Good Luck!

All these descriptions suck.

Mention mining, but use the word generate. Mention crypto, but use the word secure. Do not use the word 'wallet'.

Point out the following traits:

- Secure
- Electronic payments
- Capped circulation
- Hedge against inflation
- No single controlling body
- Currently used by merchants
- Unlimited divisibility
- Huge potential for third world countries

Here's what I wrote for the sidebar of /r/Bitcoin. It'd make a good first paragraph.

Whistles

An open source peer-to-peer digital currency. Bitcoin is
 a digital currency a protocal and a software that enables:
- Instant peer-to-peer payments
- Worldwide payments
- Almost no processing fees
- And much more
Bitcoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority;
manning transactions and the issuing of bitcoins is carried out collectively
by the network. Through many of its unique properties, Bitcoin allows exciting
uses that could not be covered by any previous payment system.
The Software is a community-driven, free, open-source project released under the MIT license

IGNORE MY POST - WILL RE EDIT

Sry 4 my bad engrish :P
But ur guys "selling" bitcoins or advertising.
I mean many of you...

Tell your mom or grandpa in a few words what is bitcoins.
Absolutely not crypto, programmable and such sh8t.

My few satoshis (feel free translate it to english ;))
Bitcoin is like paypal or world_bank for every1 in da world with internet. No authority, no IDs, no banks, no chargebacks.
You dont't need an email, FB, papyal CC, ID or whatever. You can buy it with cash or bank account on exchange.
You with 1 click.


It price will be 100x higher in

Mention "peer to peer" and 99% of the world's eyes will glaze over with 'sounds like a scam' or 'this is for geeks'
This is what is holding bitcoin back, most people on here all very techy savy so can see the elegance of the bitcoin system, mining, cryptography used, proof of work, etc..  and want to enlighten people on this amazing tech but most people in the world dont' give a c**p about how it works, but they should care what it's implication is.

I too would love to hear is a succinct way of describing why people should care and how they get them.

Here's my 200 word summary in case it inspires a reasonable elevator pitch I can use too as this is a bit long winded...


Bitcoin is a limited resource commodity (only 21 million ever to be available) whereby the value, currently at ~£80/coin, comes from people wanting to own some fraction of these limited coins to trade with other people.  Anyone can create a wallet, which is much like a random email address, to store their coins.  Local currency, products or work can be used to exchange bitcoins from someone who already owns some. Only the person with the wallet password can transfer coins from that wallet to another person's wallet and is incredibly secure by design.  It is the most successful digital commodity experiment to date and not run or owned by any company, government or individual.  It is paradigm shift for world trading in that banks are no longer necessary to facilitate transactions or store personal wealth.

-Bitcoin is Internet Money that cannot inflate cause of a fixed limit of 21 Million.
-You can trasfer it within minutes anywhere in the world.
-Transfers cannot be reversed, same as Ca$h.
-People store and exchange Bitcoins directly. There is no Bank needed.
- Transaction costs are multiple times lower than Bank-Transfers


(my Grandma knows exactly what "inflate" means cause she lived during the 2nd World War)

I think the lack of inflation would get me a big  :o :o :o :o fom my grandma :)

I would avoid to say it's peer-to-peer money, my grandma knows nothing about p2p. It's also not neccessary.

You can tell her it is decentralized, and it is run by the whole network of computer.