Just because you pretend the two are inseparable does not mean they are. If bitcoin became the primary form of money in Kenya or Zimbabwe or whatever, the economies of those countries would be further crushed when Satoshi or whoever decides to drop a load of 50k coins. And they will rightly see that a bitcoin is no better than a zimbabwe trillion dollar bill.

Bitcoin's innovation is not that it prevents double-spending.  That was invented by David Chaum in the 1990s and formed the basis of DigiCash. Nor is "mining" new; that's from Hashcash in the 1990s. Bitcoin combines the two concepts. The end result is a lot like Digicash, but distributed. 

I really don't know what you are trying to convey.

I can say that I'm really interested in the perception of the Bitcoin project, both amongst those who can read the source code and those who wont understand it. For the project with about 25 thousand lines of hard-to-read code the amount of misunderstanding among the software professionals is within my expected boundaries.

For non-practitioners in software I just don't have a frame of reference. I'm just trying to comprehend what they are imagining or believing as the features of Bitcoin. And if they believe then whom and in what claims. I find this very interesting and this is what is continuing to draw me to this forum.

Clearly you are an experienced investor, since you've quickly seen through the facade of Bitcoinica and Zhoutong's posts. Also clearly, you must rely on somebody's else opinions about the actual underlying technology.

I've heard that the state of Utah and the Mormon church was interested in bitcoins. 

The implementation of Bitcoin is what I am most fascinated by. Because I came into Bitcoin as a Miner, I have a different appreciation of a unit of value. I didn't purchase my first bitcoins, I mined them. I played poker with them, and I never used MtGox until I was working on the Bitcoin ATM. In other words, though there was an abstract notion in my head about their value, based on what I read the exchange value was, I thought more about Bitcoins having a cumulative value, rather than a dollar pegged value.

So, am I positive about Bitcoin's future?

100%

Am I positive about Bitcoin currently? Why?

Yes and No. There are three main types in Bitcoin: Miners, Programmers & Speculators. Speculators have proven that they can drive the network, where Bitcoins produced are redeemable for units of Fiat. This project is the first of its kind, and will not be the last. What an exceptional experiment. Many of us have learned about Cryptography, Parallel Processing and Money Science. Freaking awesome! Many others who are here are out of work, and are dusting off useful skills that can and should be put to work in the broader workplace. What an awesome way to brush up!

I don't like the infighting, the polarized nature of this forum, and I really hope that those who are feeling paranoid thoughts, delusions of grandeur and unhealthy hatred towards Bitcoin or people in these forums, please seek help. Go outside, meet people in real life, stop feeling sorry for yourselves. STOP tying your value of your self, and your skills to the value of Bitcoin.

This is the moment in time that distinguishes the winners from the losers. Bitcoin and its variants are far from dead, and the weak hands of the main 3 spokes that support the wheel, the Miners, the Programmers and the Speculators, they are being shaken out of the tree.

ATM's will never work. I know how to make them work in a real world scenario, but it requires a larger user base. Chicken and the egg. There is no window of certainty out to 12 months with Bitcoin, so bringing in the required investment to build out is highly unlikely. It's a dangerous gamble.

There are many things that need to happen before you'll be seeing Bitcoin ATMs. It makes about as much sense as a Gold ATM.

We need to focus on POS, online merchant services, and market liquidity / exchange options before anything like the Bitcoin ATM can succeed beyond a moderately reported press release and niche market adoption. There's no money in it as an operator. I promise. Perhaps someone could sell leases for Bitcoin ATMs with software pre loaded, and could integrate a cash recycler device to lower service costs, and then perhaps they could go a step further and franchise the opportunity, and provide the required compliance officers, and AML documentation processing, you know.. back end administration.

Then go find 50 people willing to pay for their territory, and who are also willing to pay 500-750 a month to have a purpose built kiosk.

The company / group that succeeds will still be heavily subsidizing marketing and back end costs for many, many quarters to come.

-Jonathan

Bump and cross-link to Elliott Wave Educational Video Series - a seminar of Prechter's from "more than 15 years ago".


His biological son or are we speaking intellectually here?

Yeah looks like he plopped it back up at $2.0. But before he plopped it up, $2.00 had a total amount of 1,100. This shows how much the manipulator is involved as almost the entire $2.00 is by this 1 bidder.

If you do not know what you are doing, no don't use it!

I expected a warning because it was nowhere informed that his could be done, only that.

And sorry being being a asshole, I am upset of how you handled stuff, but this does not give me the right to keep annoying you.

It doesn't make sense to use Yubikey via API.

API.

If you just leave your BTC deposit like that everything will be fine. When you owed Bitcoinica over $1,000 and your BTC deposit is dropping in value, why would you expect a warning.

I have already apologized for the logging problem. (The ledger was not designed in our system yet.) If remembered correctly, your deposits were liquidated at the price higher than $3. You should buy now instead of complaining.

It may not be a good price, but what were you doing when there was a good price?

Bitcoinica is not the place for you to owe USD and hold BTC indefinitely. It may be wrong to you, but the market is always correct.

I got a MASSIVE Zhoutonged...

I mean: I got my BTC deposit liquidated (not a normal position, be it short or long).

Without warning, and it does not show on the logs.

300+ BTC

Um nobody every prohibited any bank from exchanging bitcoins.  They never will.  Ever.  Not unless Bitcoin is already accepted by the masses.  Bitcoin is potentially (not in its current implementation but in its potential for "someday") the greatest threat banks have ever faced.  It makes them mostly obsolete and cuts them out of the trillion dollar business of collecting fees from people to "let" them spend their own money.

Banks will fight to the bloody end to kill, minimize, and disrupt Bitcoin.  When a major bank offers Bitcoin exchange service it means they have already lost.  Bitcoin has become the dominant method of global payment and continuing to fight Bitcoin is simply futile.

Until that day happens (if ever) the banks will NEVER support Bitcoin (or any alternative which undermines their very existence).