I would not be able to spend BTC quite so easily in my day-to-day life where I'm from (Philippines). Simply because it hasn't been fully recognized here and the concept of cryptocurrencies isn't really something that can easily be accepted or digested by the people here. Although there are signs of progress such as a few businesses (ie. restaurants, deal grocers, property marketplaces, meat shops) allowing the use of btc in transactions.

I think most of you missed his/her point. OP wasn't talking about what its current price is but how its value is measured based on actual concrete factors (such as the example he used with gold and manual labor although I don't think the value of gold is equal to the cost incurred in mining it). In my opinion, what could justify BTC's price is its value in being a decentralized currency. What I mean by this is that people see value in the use of a currency wherein no authoritarian entity is looming over them watching their transactions and no third party incurring additional transaction fees.

I get that they're trying to push the use of Lightning, not to be a pessimist, but their demographic is fairly minuscule and may possibly lead to underwhelming sales. Their target market are people who are more inclined to order ice cream and have it delivered to them than just going to a store and buying it themselves, these people must also be in possession of bitcoins, additionally these people must also be willing to spend their bitcoins which is somewhat rare since more and more people are treating btc like a stock more than a currency.

Hi kind of a newbie question here. Transactions as in using btc to buy stuff? Or the buying and selling of btc itself? If it was the former, this is probably because people are starting to treat BTC as more of a stock than a currency right?

This is very similar to the WannaCry ransomware attack on May 2017. Your computer and its files would be held for ransom in exchange for bitcoins but the only difference here was that the WannaCry hackers actually did give back your files after you paid the ransom. They even released an apology for the people who've paid and still can't access their files yet and actually even worked on a solution to give back their files. Some hackers still have ethics I guess. 

Bottom line is prevention is always better than recovery, be careful of emails that redirect you to phishing sites and for the love of God backup your files.

You have to look at both sides of the coin here.

1. He has a point. In a way, btc is technically anonymous and its decentralized nature does make it easier for "bad guys" to go about their business and commit illegal transactions and the like.

2. Even without bitcoin, people with malicious intent or fraudulent activities will always find a way so btc isn't really the subject that should be put on the chopping block here but the people who commit the crimes.

Invest in both! Generally it is better to spread out your resources to different investments than to pool them in one. Other than gold and bitcoin try researching on other stocks and commodities you can invest on. Good luck! 

While I do believe that bitcoin, because of its decentralized nature, is convenient to use in illegal transactions online and is somehow giving "bad guys" an easier way to go about their business. Upon reading the article, I don't think that bitcoin is to blame when it comes to hackers. Hackers have been around even before bitcoin and will still be around long after. My point is that there will always be people with malicious intent regardless of motivation. 

I don't see any reason as to why one would centralize btc, it would go against Satoshi's vision of eliminating "middle-men" from transactions. The reason bitcoin was made the way it is, is to get rid of "double-spending" wherein a third-party who oversees the transaction also gets a percentage of the money spent. I also like to think that Satoshi came up with bitcoin as a big "FU" to "the man" or the government in general, giving us a way to do transactions without an authoritarian entity watching over us.

I share your sentiments in general, the part about using renewable or "green" energy. Not really sure if this is also applicable where you live but where I'm from the problem is renewable energy isn't cheap (ie. buying and setting up solar panels on the roof of your house). I think a person who runs a btc mining farm would have sufficient resources to also invest in tapping sources of renewable energy if they cared enough but that's another problem, some people just lack sincere concern for the environment.  

The future is now! Sounds like something straight out of Blade Runner or something. Pretty glad that more and more people are being more open to the concept of using cryptocurrencies in their businesses.

Not to be a dick, just sharing my opinion. My professor in an information security class once said that "nothing can be 100% secure". So if this - "the first fully encrypted, hack-proof smartphone" is how they're advertising it then their marketing team has no idea what they're talking about. "Rigorous hacking tests for two months" also doesn't say much, rigorous testing is done with any software during development. When most hackers see this they would take it as a challenge, so by advertising it like this they are actually making the product a bigger target for people with malicious intent and the right set of skills.

Talk to them about time management and prioritization. Tell them that to succeed in this life one must know how to see things as a whole and not confine oneself into a silo (in this case the silo is cryptos). They won't be involved in cryptos for the rest of their life, tell them that they should have a fallback. Just because they're earning through cryptos doesn't mean they have to drop everything else. Instead of using cryptocurrencies as a sole source of livelihood tell them to think of it instead as an additional source of income. Also advice them to not only invest in cryptocurrencies but also commodities (stocks). Teach them the principle of not putting all of one's eggs in one basket, that spreading out your resources to different investment minimizes loss and maximizes potential profit.

The point of the video that you watched was to show people, in a sardonic way, that BTC can and is already accepted as a form of payment in some establishments. To answer your question, they say gold is better in the context of investment and value. This is because most people prefer to believe in the value of things that are tangible, things that they can physically hold in their hand than a "digital currency" that they have never heard of before. Cryptocurrency is a fairly unfamiliar concept to most people.

Agreed. I don't really understand people who sell when prices start dropping, I mean when prices drop you technically don't lose anything unless you start selling.

A friend of mine didn't invest a dime in BTC but he has earned roughly about $4000 worth of bitcoin. He was able to do this through signature campaigns wherein he was paid in bitcoins, he then invested his earnings to stocks (not really sure what stocks) and doubled what he already earned in bitcoin. He is probably the richest guy my age that I know. So the short answer to your question is yes you can start from zero cash and make a living from crypto. All you need is perseverance and willingness to learn new things since he had to do research on cryptos, signature campaigns and the nature of the stocks he invested in.

If I had BTC in December 2017 during the $19k price, I probably would have cashed out since $19k is the all time high for bitcoin price. Choosing to hold or not even cashing out a fraction of your investment during an all time high would be dumb. But to say it is too late for those who held during the $19k correction is incorrect, they can still earn from their investment not as much as what they would have earned during December of 2017 but they can still earn nonetheless.

I have thought about the future, but with the volatile nature of BTC I would not have all my eggs in one basket but instead use the money I earn from investing in BTC to also invest in other stocks. Having your resources spread out across different investments is safer than having them all invested in BTC.

I haven't cashed out any of my BTC. I am thinking of the long-term so I would probably allocate the money I earn from BTC in other commodities (invest in stocks) in the hopes of earning more in the long run.

There is no definite way to predict these things, what we can do is use historical data to at least estimate possible prices in the future. In the last 6 months the highest BTC price was around $19k and this was during the holidays, which was probably a significant factor in the price increase. For it to reach $50k the highest price in the last 6 months would need to increase by more than 200%, not to be a pessimist just trying to be realistic here. I predict that it probably wont reach $50k this year.