Bitcoin Forum

I'll use the current rate of $5.63 as my example. (this idea may work on eBay as well)

This is for people who want Bitcoin ASAP, for whatever reason.

I offer to sell the weirdest quote (or some other mundane item easily transferred over the internet--eBook also comes to mind) in the past 24 hours for $6.10. Along with your purchase, I will give you a free Bitcoin currently worth $5.63 ($6.10-$.17-$.30=$5.63).

Or do it the other way. For only $10, I will sell you the text of Satoshi Nakamoto's write paper translated into Latin. With each order, I will give you $9.41 worth of Bitcoin, free ($10.00-$.29-$.30=$9.41).

Therefore, there will be no charge backs for the receiver received exactly what they paid for plus a free gift. Of course, you'll have to be careful on the wording. I'm aware that person A can purchase Bitcoin from person B via PayPal on trust alone, but I offer this up for the purpose of selling BTC outright on the internet.

A real world example is selling a mattress. In most states, if not all, it's illegal to sell a mattress. But you can sell the bed frame and give the mattress away for free, hence getting paid more for the bed frame because the mattress is included. It's now illegal to purchase an old baby crib, but you can give it away free with the purchase of the mattress. Seems odd, but that's what happening.

OK, Go!

As long as you're selling a digital good (like an eBook), you face the same chargeback problem.  PayPal always sides with the buyer in digital goods sales.  If you sold a physical book, delivered to the buyer's confirmed PayPal address, and offered free Bitcoins, you should be safe.

Of course, PayPal might still freeze your account if it's associated with Bitcoins at all.  Back when I was running CoinPal, they froze one of my PayPal accounts even though it had never been involved with a Bitcoin sale.  The account was associated with me and I had done Bitcoin sales with another account.

Heh, that's an old trick that ticket scalpers tried ... and the reason they use that is not necessarily to make them less likely to get busted, but actually to make the buyer feel more comfortable about making the purchase.   (which is really bizarre, because buying a ticket above face value is not against the law, just selling the ticket above face is where the problem arises in most jurisdictions.)

Here's an example:
  - http://www.lsureveille.com/news/the-c-section-free-football-ticket-with-50-pen-an-illegal-scalping-tactic-1.2629704

But Bitcoin is different, .. it isn't against the law to trade.  At some level of trading it may become necessary in some jurisdictions to register as a money service business but if you are describing how miners can sell a few BTCs on ebay, I hardly would think that would apply.  

So it is simply a matter of PayPal's user agreement prohibiting the use of PayPal's payment network when trading bitcoins.  And as long as you as a seller aren't relying on PayPal to help you should a chargeback occur and don't mind them freezing your account and holding any funds that you had in the account (or doing a clawback against your bank account even), sure -- your idea should work just fine.

Someone on eBay is selling these:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1-Bitcoin-BTC-Digital-Currency-/120780952175?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c1f1b126f

Anyone heard of bitcard before?
I think it may just be a piece of paper with an instawallet address on the back.

Seems like an easy way to do it though.


Edit - actually it's a globalstandardbank.com product

This Canadian seller hasn't bought or sold anything on eBay for over 5 1/2 years, now he's selling Bitcoin. He/she used to sell mostly books and videos. Curious what the prior eBay account name was, or if it was changed more than once.

Interesting that it sold for $7.50 when the Mt. Gox price is closer to $5...   Hmmm....

actually if you buy one of those you get a nice piece of plastic with some numbers on it, see the activation process when they should send you the real bitcoins... http://www.globalstandardbank.com/Global_Standard/Global_Standard_Bank_Activate.html

Gary Horsman also owns this: http://garyhorsmandesign.com/portfolio000.htm

A very handsome portfolio. Check out his pics.