Bitcoin Forum

I think Bitcoin needs a currency system reform. The way it is now, it's scaring people away, even though it is just psychological. Using other units like mBit is not much helpful either.

The best way is to continue to use 1 Bitcoin as a unit name and move the radix point 3 steps to the right, so:

0.001 old BTC = 1.00 new BTC.

In countries where hyperinflation occurs, it's a common approach to make a monetary reform and usually move the radix point 3 steps to the left. Since Bitcoin is hyperdeflating, it makes sense to do the opposite.

I think this will greatly improve BTC acceptance. Like it is today, it's just silly to go buy a coffee for 0.0015 BTC. It's not how most people are used to buy things.

In order for this to be effective, it's not enough to do this just in speech, wallets and prices at stores should display the new unit system. I'm not sure how difficult it would be to change this at the software level though.

In other words make rich people richer and poor people poorer?

It's just a naming convention, it wouldn't make people richer or poorer.

I agree, doing that would be a psychological incentive for the masses.

Give it time till BTC goes x10 though, you shouldn't make this re-evaluation every year, it can confuse too and give the impression of inflation.


 ???

The "psychological" effect goes both ways.

People need to stop thinking 1 BTC should equal 1 USD or something. BTC was designed with units until satoshis to counter the inflation and the value of BTC.

How, exactly, would this make rich people richer and poor people poorer? http://s13.postimg.org/e0wkewn1f/facepalm.png

Printing new money like crazy and distribute it only amongst banks, i.e. what the FED and ECB are doing every day, that's what makes the rich richer and the poor poorer.

Shifting to smaller Bitcoin units can more or less be considered to be effectively the same as printing new money, except now it's evenly distributed along all current owners of money, instead of just a few elite monopolists. HUGE difference.

Is it time to move gold's radix a few decimal places? I mean, 1 bar of of gold is like $30,000 or something. We should consider 0.0001 bar of gold to be the 'new bar of gold'.

Or perhaps people should just wake the f*ck up and use their brain.

People who are as stupid to think "1 BTC is almost $1000, that's too expensive per unit" will be the latecomers. Their loss.

But that's the way the masses think, seriously!

It will give Litecoin a good boost...

Would you agree that ahifting to smaller BTC units is technically inflation, but without the negative effects of (common) inflation?

People don't use gold to buy a coffee. Gold is a commodity not a currency. People don't use gold units in their monthly expenses spreasheet. It's different from bitcoins.

I know. There will be a big mass of latecomers!

But I agree, something in this direction may help to speed up mass adoption.

If we keep calling these new units "BTC" (though they are 1/1000th of the previous BTC) then yes.

The negative effect of common inflation = the money in our wallet and on our bank loses value. Doesn't happen with shifting to smaller BTC unit! http://s24.postimg.org/ekrxi3iip/thumbsup.png

actually it's deflation, not inflation, right?

"Is it time to move gold's radix a few decimal places? I mean, 1 bar of of gold is like $30,000 or something. We should consider 0.0001 bar of gold to be the 'new bar of gold'."

There are so many flaws with this argument it's not funny. Gee why do you think silver outsells gold by an order of magnitude? Do you it could be because the average person thinks its cheaper? They think they are getting more for their money and they think they can't afford gold, even though they could buy a tiny gold coin for the same price as a silver eagle.


"Or perhaps people should just wake the f*ck up and use their brain."

Yes, you should.

We would need to move it every couple of years then since USD inflation soars and BTC deflation increases.

It may actually be a better idea to switch the values of the satoshi and the btc. Regardless, the only reason 95% of the alternative cryptocurrencies exist is because the perception is that the price of bitcoins is too high. If you want a taxi driver in Botswana to start accepting payments in bitcoins then you'd better make it easy for him/her because they probably didn't stay at school too long. Otherwise btc becomes just another  elite investment for people who had access to a good education.

I don't think moving the radix will work.

More realistically create a good name for mBTC and start using that as the primary unit of reference.

Too much of the software and awareness is curently build around the decimal point where it is currently. It would be too disruptive to change that now.

Even if we did it, it would only be a temporary solution. In a few years time you would need to move the decimal point again.

Better just to change ot mBTC and in a few years to uBTC.

Rich people get richer regardless.

I tend to agree the idea has merit and would probably boost price.
I have heard the counter argument that the $1,000 price tag is a psychological
plus, not a minus since the 'real-ness' of that amount is what helps make headlines, also
that it draws comparison with high stock prices from goog at >$1100  to berkshire hathaway
at 172,000+ per share.

In any case I think it would be too disruptive to pull off even with consensus.

As I said before, BitCoin is not a investment product, it is a alternative currency designed to replace the current one. There is no need to think how much a BitCoin is worth in USD; we only think that because we have to pay most things in USD. It doesn't matter how much BTC is worth in USD; How much a person is willing to sell a pizza for BTC is more important, regardless of the USD worth.

Actually in the Bitcoin world, this is not true anymore.

It is very hard to actually to increase your Bitcoin holdings using just Bitcoin.

There is no in-built mechanism to increase your wealth with interest as it works in the fiat world.

Rather, Bitcoin, once fully matured, will have entropy in the sense that holders of Bitcoin can only either just hold or will slowly lose Bitcoins over the course of time.

On Blockchain.info, it's possible to set the currency displayed on the site to mBTC.

this is a very interesting question, and in fact bitcoin is an experiment playing out before our eyes.

Most currencies start with a non-decimal number > 0, and are inflated over time.  EG. 5 pennies buys a beer in 1900; hundred years later 500 pennies buys a beer.

Or in Korea modern day, 1000 won buys you a candy bar; 10000 won buys you a cheap meal; 3.000.000 won/month rents a small apart-uh

So there is definitely merit to the idea of changing to mBTC - currencies in numbers > 0  are what humans are used to.

BTC, if the deflationary theory holds true, will only increase in value over time, and for everyday usage, ie. buying a coffee, the BTC units will go deeper and deeper into smaller decimals. This is unlike what people are used to and many newcomers may find it unintuitive.

Ie. a coffee costs 0.004 BTC; several years later it may cost 0.0004 BTC.
Dealing with so many decimals is quite difficult. Can you imagine if BTC reaches $100,000? How many decimals will you have to count out in order to send your friend 5 bucks??    decimals: 4 ---- (0.00005)


However, the experiment is interesting - perhaps people will adapt to bitcoin's small decimal and get used to it. After all, majority of bitcoiners today have
grown with BTC and are more and more used to sending amounts of 0.01, 0.001, etc. by  now.

Most likely in the upcoming years, shops will switch to mBTC prices, and software and websites will display both mBTC and BTC for an extended transition period.

I personally think switching to mBTC makes sense, and we should do it sometime in 2014.

Yeah, you are right, well spotted!

Are humans used to a non physical currency that does not exist except for transaction records? no. There is no need to change something to suit people's needs. People will eventually change for BitCoin.

Exactly, I wouldn't want to be confused that the price of bitcoin going up is somehow connected to inflation... ::)

Really?  Do you think that will happen any time soon?  You would be better off if you stopped wasting your time trying to change Bitcoin, and created a coin of your own.  BrasilCoin perhaps?  I can see it now! :)

I agree. Bitcoin is designed to replace currency, which is something many of you don't understand. If you don't like it, don't use it, create a crappy coin yourself.

I'm sure you helped many people lives telling them what they have to do with their time.  ::)

Just like you suggesting the Bitcoin developers need to make changes to the Bitcoin software and hard fork the network.
Who is going to write the code, you?
Obviously you have absolutely no idea how ridiculous your suggestion is, what it involves, and why it will never happen.  This thread is a complete waste of everyone's time, including yours.  I was just pointing that out, hopefully by sacrificing a few minutes of my time, I can prevent many others from wasting time on this thread.  Time that would be better spent on something more productive.

You spend far too much time trying to manage other people's lives. Guess what, one of my favorites pastimes is arguing with stupid trolls on the internet. Sue me.....

"Obviously you have absolutely no idea how ridiculous your suggestion is, what it involves, and why it will never happen.  This thread is a complete waste of everyone's time, including yours.  I was just pointing that out, hopefully by sacrificing a few minutes of my time, I can prevent many others from wasting time on this thread.  Time that would be better spent on something more productive."

Please do the world a favor and don't reproduce. Man, I thought I could be a worthless, arrogant dickhead but I have a long way to go. Impressive.

mbtc should be refered to as millibitcoin(s), following metric prefixes, which have worked very well for the majority of the world for centuries.

You think it sounds dumb? Fine. Don't use it. We won't change the entire network to suit some people who think a name is "dumb".
Try and protest that "cents" or "pence" is dumb, would the governments change it? NO. This is just a retarded suggestion.