Now I am confused....I thought the OP made a blatant attempt to get people to sell Bitcoins and the second poster demonstrated (rather hilariously) how to more directly connecting the dots...

Or was the OP serious?  I didn't see an actual argument in the original post...

No offense to either one of you, OP or the person I am about to reference if the answer is no. But are you Luke-jr?

That is your response, give me a break.   That is what I thought.   

Ok, you want to call me out, I will explain my reasoning.   Just read the totality of all your posts on this thread and see how you tactic changed from post to post trying every little angle to see what is effective.  At first you were this mis-understood person that JUST couldn't get the words out so we could have sympathy.  Then as more of the serious members come in and start challenging you, slowly (a miracle), you got your voice and your opinion got more and more complex right before out eyes.   It vastly expanded, like magic.   Now you a full grown man or women, with lots of big words and structure sentences.  

Now, to the point you made about my mining company.  I mine for two reasons, I can do it profitably (sustainable at the moment) and it supports the network.  I actually first mined in the Spring of 2010 when I heard about this concept and thought it was going to just be a hobby project, wow, look at us now.   I actually have not actually used my words thus far to push anyone in either direction when we are talking about BTC in this thread.   People can do what they want, I was just address these comments you are throwing around.   I actually have seen this post for a little bit and wasn't going to read it because I knew this was what is was going to be.   Guess what, I was right, shame on me.

D

This guy is a plant, maybe someone should ban him for being disingenuous.   I am serious.

Don't sit here and try and play stupid after you went off and wrote a bunch propaganda against Bitcoin and then you sit here trying to get sympathy because you can't not express your word properly.   You are a joke,  I will give every person the ability to grow and learn, so who knows, maybe we will even be friends?   Until then, why not try reading and listening more before you come here throwing around such large opinions here that you know is going to get people on here expressing their own.  

D

The OP is utter garbage.   The whole reason Sastoshi made BTC was to take control of a exchange unit out of the control of few people and put it into a different system of management.   I think this is just trolling of the first order.  No one said BTC was the solution, just an alternative.   What ever agency sent this shill should please try and give a higher quality shill in the future.

D

What about the sudden implementation of withdrawal limits on savings accounts? Apparently, more than 6 withdrawals from savings per month is some kind of federal reporting trigger, and the bank can and will close your account for exceeding that. I don't recall any such limitation until recently, although I am not sure what law was passed to make that effective. They insist that you use a checking account for frequent transfers instead.

I wonder if there is some backdoor law that allows them to snoop on checking accounts but not savings accounts, and so they decided to make savings accounts less useful. It's strange.

Unlike others here I'm gonna have a go at addressing your concerns and help reason this out.

Your fear, as I understand it, is that because there is no authority to regulate the value of Bitcoin, then it will catastrophically fail one day when natural market forces suddenly swing into a bank run when some individual, agent, company, etc. sells en-masse huge numbers of coins or commits some action that panics the market and there's a massive incentive to bail out of Bitcoin. Your other posts say that you are confident that cryptographically and procedurally Bitcoin is not in danger, simply that the value of Bitcoin is not controlled by an overseeing agency. OK? ok.

Something you distinguish as critical defining qualities of the USD and BTC is:

• USD value is regulated by the Federal Reserve.
• BTC value is not regulated and only subject to market forces.

On the surface that looks to be a big difference but consider a further, fundamentally defining attribute.

• Federal Reserve can create infinite credit to introduce more USD and impose "interest rates" to mitigate credit created.
• Bitcoin has a limited supply, and fixed distribution rate. No credit.

Now, as I understand it, the Federal Reserve's purpose was to help stabilise massive economies and help prevent catastrophic crashes by creating credit to ease huge losses (essentially bail out banks) and impose interest rates in the good times to help mitigate credit introduced into the financial system (this is obviously a very simple description, and I could be wrong). The Federal reserve's initial purpose was to regulate the supply of money created by banks so inflation didn't destroy the currency, but also soften the impact of crashes in the future (I think this is why in 1907 after the crash the fed was created https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_reserve).

Now if you noticed, USD has absolutely no distribution control, credit into the system and interest rates is largely controlled by the Fed at the whim of men in skyscrapers wearing expensive suits that are corruptible, flawed and terrifying. Bitcoin on the other hand doesn't need a central authority controlling distribution because it is already mandated how new money is created and a HARD limit on the maximum amount of money circulating in the system is very tightly controlled. Everyone that uses Bitcoin agrees to this, without exception or reservation.

What this leaves us with is the market itself. In a USD market swings in growth or a contraction in growth can be artificially slowed by the Fed. But this is also ripe for abuse, wars can be quickly funded by creating more money, as well as bailing out institutions "too big to fail", without needing to hold anyone to account. It means bad men can be kept in power and no-one will necessarily be held to account. Manipulating the money supply to small degrees doesn't adversely affect rich individuals, governments, or corporations very badly but it means the buying power of middle class and lower class is severely undercut as inflation slowly undermines the value of what little dollars they have (this means the rich stay rich since they have a huge supply of money on hand, but the middle/lower class get hit much harder financially, since they have little/nothing for when bad times arise) . Interest rates also hit the middle and lower classes the worst too. Whats more, Democratic systems can't change monetary policy since the Fed is an independent non-governmental entity.

The Bitcoin market however is a wily and uncontrolled beast as you imply. I believe the answer is a bit more grey though. In the early stages of the Bitcoin economy (like now) we will definitely have fluctuations in value that are largely beyond control, it is Bitcoin's wild west we are experiencing right now. Caveat emptor should be the catch-cry for Bitcoin novices. But the fact is that very few people have Bitcoins, the distribution is not thin enough that a single individual's buying power won't cause massive swings as large buys and sells are made. But over time as Bitcoins get distributed among more users, the Bitcoin supply slows, more businesses trade in Bitcoin, and more miners enter the race to validate blocks, I believe we'll see the value of Bitcoin reach a stable level. Bitcoinica also demonstrated how trading mechanisms can help minimise trader's fears and help stabilise Bitcoin value, lets hope another, better implemented and planned trading platform fills this gap. Bad news, and mad rushes as a new part of society embraces Bitcoin as the next big thing are definitely growing pains that we will all experience to a greater or lesser extent. An overseer could "stabilise" this, but we must weigh up the good with the bad here. Any human intervention on value is entirely corruptible, regardless of what "safety mechanisms" are put in place. The USD's Fed system is probably the worst of them all, and I for one would never want a Fed-like system, or even something similar with human(s) at the helm "Benevolently" keeping our Bitcoin's value safe. As long as Bitcoin remains useful, stable (code-wise and cryptographically wise), and well supported by the mining community, Bitcoin's value as a currency is fairly well assured. It needs no overseer.

Trust the market, or trust the Fed. Only one of these has no agenda over the value of your money.

sounds like you should stick with usd.  bitcoin at this point in time is not ready for Gavin's grandma but when it is perhaps you will be ready to use it.

welcome to the real world, mi amigo.  yes there is greed all around us. I argue, however, that wallstreet has more greed than bitcoiners.

ridgemont, ok, so the USA is responsible
for USD.  what about gold? who is
responsible for gold?

What do you need help with? People are really pretty helpful here.

The little guys comprise muck more than 49% so I think you must be confused.

(hopefully not an aside)

I feel that something is happening here in the States, but I can't put my finger on it. Over a year ago, I was able to withdraw $10K USD from my bank whenever I wanted. Then I was told that I needed to inform the bank a couple days prior to when I needed said amount. Fast forward a few months, and the maximum I could withdraw at one time with a three day notice was half as much. Fast forward again to a couple weeks ago.

I delivered a load of lumber to Elk Grove Village, IL. The client gave me a $2K USD check and he offered to go to his bank with me to make sure I had no problems cashing it. Since he was a new client, and it would be nice to have the extra cash in my pocket for the next leg of my trip to Wisconsin to purchase more lumber, I didn't refuse.

At the bank, I presented to the teller the check and my state ID (my license is still being held in DeKalb county, IL, due to receiving two tickets at the same time--long story, but suffice to say that a bitch is involved). This has worked every other time that I wanted to cash a check at some unknown bank (not a branch of my bank). But not this time. She wanted to see a credit card. I presented her with one. She said that won't work because it will expire in two months. I presented her with my voter registration card. No joy there either. Then I remembered the ticket I received that resides in my wallet and the officer who gave it to me said that this will now work as your official ID until you get your license back.

It gets better.

She looked at it and stated...wait for it (you won't believe it!)...that that would work, but only if I had presented that form of identification first and the second state ID with my photo on it second. It was now time for Plan D. The guy who wrote me the check, standing next to me the whole time, to step in.

We'll call he Ed, since that is his real first name. Ed hands the teller lady his ID to prove that he was the one who wrote the check to me. The lady asks ED...wait for it..., "What do you want me to do with this?" Ed states he's not sure, but thought that providing solid ID that this issue could somehow be resolved. The teller passes the ID back to Ed and states that that won't work. Bear in mind that this is main bank that Ed banks at and the teller has known Ed for years.

It gets better.

Ed than ask the teller to tell me how much money he currently has in his checking account. The teller states that she can't do that in my presence. He then ask if she could write it down and hand him the piece of paper. She grudgingly does it. Ed shows me the piece of paper. I recall that it was just north of $3,900 USD.

Ed then requests from the teller that he would like to withdraw $2K USD. (wait till I get to the WTF moment) The teller informs Ed that she couldn't do that for there isn't enough money in his account to give him $2K USD. (BTW, that's not the WTF moment) The teller, which is now getting impatient with us over this whole ordeal, probably because there were other customers to take care of (Ed and I were the only customers in the bank), told Ed, IN FRONT OF ME, that he only had $1,900+ in his account. Ed asked how could that be when she just shown to him that he had $3,900+. She stated no he doesn't because of...you guessed it...the $2K USD check that she currently has in her possession bought he balance down to only $1,900+. (that, too, was not the WTF moment)

Ed kindly ask for the check. She replies that she couldn't give it to him because...because...because it belonged to me. I then kindly asked for the check back. She grudgingly hands it over to me. Ed kindly asks me, in front of the teller, may I have the check please. I hand Ed the check. He proceeds to tear it up in tiny pieces in front of the teller. He then re-requests $2K of his money from his bank from a teller that he's known for years and to this day has never, ever had a problem with her or his banking institute. The teller replies with, "I think I need to get the manager."

It gets better.

After she was gone for about 5 minutes (probably telling her side of the story to the (her) manager), she and the manager arrive back to the teller booth. The manager ask, "How may I help you?" I replied with, "We both want a blowjob." (no I didn't, although the thought did cross my mind, along with wanting to fuck both of them in the ass, but I figured at that time that that wouldn't get $2K USD in my hand, so I quickly changed my thoughts to something mundane, like Matthew eating dog or...)

Ed relays what has transpired up to that point, with the manager listening contently. When he was done, the manager said that there was nothing she could do. She could not give Ed his money even though he now had more than enough in his account. Why, Ed asked. (here comes the WTF moment) The manager kindly states that it is their banks policy that any request of $2K USD or more had to be requested 3 days prior to make sure that the bank had enough money on hand for daily operations (almost exact quote). Ed and I looked at each other in shocked at what we just heard. The manager broke the silence by asking if there is anything else she could do for us today. Ed replied with, "Yes. I would like to withdraw $1,900 (USD) from my account." The manager replied with...wait for it..."No problem. Will big bills be fine?" Ed said yes, that that would be fine.

We left the bank 15 minutes later. Why so long, you ask? Well, it seems that the teller didn't even have $1,900 USD in her till and she had to requisition more money from her manager. Not the one that just waited on us, but a different one that was luckily finishing up with a client of her's on the phone. The paper was filled out, handed to that second manager, she leaves, and returns with a big wad of money. The teller sings for it after counting it--twice. She puts the money in her tell. Punches keys on what I believe is a ten-key-adder of some sort. Opens the till and pulls out the same wad of money--all twenties. She informs us that they are limited on big bills, those being the hundred dollar ones.

She counts out $1,900 not once, but twice, all the time punching keys on her right. Now she presents the bills to Ed, counting them again. I count silently with her. When we get close to the end, all three of us realize at the same time that there is now one $20 bill too many. She quickly snatches all the bills back and recounts. Yep! One too many. Recounts the bills three more times, with the last time presenting them to Ed, with the amount adjusted. All is now fine. The teller then ask if there is anything else she could do for us besides sucking both our dicks (I think that bitch was a mind reader). We said no. Thanked her and went outside.

Once outside, Ed hands me all the twenties, apologizes, and wishes me a good day. Wait, what about the other $100 USD Ed still owes me, you ask? (WTF Moment II) He already gave it to me. It was included in all those twenties. You see, when the teller thought she made a one-too-many-twenties-mistake, she thought that she was 4 short, not 1 too many (revisit underlined text above). In her mind, she only thought about that $2K USD total and not the $1.9K USD sum. Don't worry, nobody got away with anything. Ed's account was adjusted accordingly, but done so outside of the bank's new policy.

(WTF Moment III) Two days later, I found myself at my bank to withdraw $3K to pay for some other lumber I was about to purchase. The teller informed me...wait for it...that I could only withdraw $2K USD and only if I gave a 3 day notice. Naturally, I then only requested $1,900 USD, writing a check for the balance to one my suppliers.

All that said above, does anybody here have any idea what the fuck is going on with the banking institute here in the US?

~Bruno~

What checks and balances of power?

If people are such assholes why would you want them to rule over you in government?

Logical fallacy.

More importantly, don't give up. If you are sincere then you will realize that in order to sway others you must first learn to make flexible your own trunk. ;p  By that I mean to say that you just have to adjust your angle of approach in your discussion. Eventually, if what you are saying is not completely crazy people will come around and have a normal, human type talk with you.

cheers

It's been nice knowing you (not).
Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.

that' a very corny analogy..

instincts vs nature is not equal to instincts vs  concepts that are completely unnatural(i.e., money and economics are very unatural, man made concepts)