If we all started trading the EUR/BTC pair on exchanges without USD, located outside North America, would the US Gov be happy or not I wonder?
If CNY/BTC became the most liquid pair, with negligible USD/BTC volume, then US Gov could only be ecstatic beyond belief... |
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MtGox USD Price - $ 122.65, Euro Price - 94
Bitcoin.de (Germany, Europe) Euro Price - 89
The difference has been like this for weeks. I've seen it even higher.
It just goes to show how rubbish fiat is for international transfers! Check out the LTC/BTC rate on BTER and BTC-E, they are almost identical 0.0267 https://btc-e.com/exchange/ltc_btchttps://bter.com/Must be all the fees, delays and other hassles which prevent equalization for fiat/BTC across exchanges. |
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 I'm posting this here both to warn those who ignore everything other than gox not to get carried away by gox-only movement and also to try and nudge anybody with arbing capabilities to do us all a favour and make some money helping us discover where the price should be right now. Btcchina has 706 yuan. So the usdcny fx rate of 6.1 implies $115 per btc gox volume for Saturday was 22k, Sunday 20k, both extremely low. However, weekend can be low. If Monday volume not nearer 60k then grab the worry beads. |
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1. Because it has been proven to work in facilitating the transfer of products 2. Because it has worked for 4.5 years, so it is building up a history of having worked reliably 3. Because it is working right now, so there is a legitimate expectation that it will continue to work |
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I forget. How much are we paying to use this forum?
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I'm just trying to see if I understand the idea of cold storage properly. I get the idea is that you have a wallet on a computer that's never connected to the internet so you don't have to worry about viruses / hackers stealing bitcoins. But, ultimately, you may want to spend those bitcoins eventually, so sooner or later it'll have to connect to the internet to do that.
What's the idea behind this? Is it basically using a "sneaker net" method where you send a signed transaction, carry it over on a flash drive, and receive it on an internet-connected computer? That's my understanding of how it works, but I'm not sure if I'm correct about that.
Yes. That's how it works. Done it myself. This is nice documentation: https://bitcoinarmory.com/using-offline-wallets-in-armory/ |
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Had a good time at the conference, definitely met some cool people. This week could be interesting.
Loaded, are you getting any vibes about whether the Dwolla problem is scaring fiat off Mt Gox, or no real impact? I have received over $250k in wires from Gox since the Dwolla account seizure with no issues. Hopefully they will obtain the proper licensing and have it all resolved soon. Agreed! |
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Had a good time at the conference, definitely met some cool people. This week could be interesting.
Loaded, are you getting any vibes about whether the Dwolla problem is scaring fiat off Mt Gox, or no real impact? |
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Hmm, maybe the optimum block size limit is not 1 MB, but "infinity" is certainly the worst choice of all. It is also clear that at some point it will have to become limited...
1MB and "infinity" are the extremes. There is a middle-ground which is a market-driven block size. This is achieved by a fees-market where there is competition for block-space. This was Satoshi's original vision, which still seems very sensible (not just because Satoshi liked it). The 25 BTC block reward is relatively high compared to fees, so a viable fees market won't occur until blocks are about 20 to 50Mb in size. Which is large but not outrageously so. The 1MB limit makes the fees market stillborn, and never gives this essential feature of Bitcoin a chance to develop. |
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I think people start realizing that increasing block size limit is not a solution but a new problem (e.g. http://keepbitcoinfree.org). If block size limit is kept, I see no reason why bitcoin should fail. This video is FUD designed to further a personal agenda which is to be the renowned architect of the 3rd-party systems, which 99% of Bitcoin users will be forced to use when they are priced away from the blockchain. The essence of the video is that decentralization is at risk. Evidence is showing otherwise: Bitcoin has a record number of active nodes, 350,000+, and this is increasing even as average block size is increasing. http://bitnodes.io/The recent days and weeks and months an ever-increasing number of alt-coins has entered flooded the market. This does not reduce BTC value as it seems, but it seems to dilute the value of all other alt-coins.
One of the alt-coins will have a flexible block size limit. If Bitcoin users find their transactions no longer work they will quickly use the alt coin which does work. Markets cleave to the best technology. Think Tesla's AC dominating world electrical systems instead of Edison's DC which has a niche role. Bitcoin has one chance for glory and a rigid block size limit will kill that chance. |
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Consider what would be the rational / game theory response by Central Banks to Bitcoin when their investigative sub-committees confirm it as an existential threat.
The answer is to acquire a useful percentage of Bitcoin, or any similarly growing crypto-clone. With 21 million possible coins, 11 million issued, a CB representing a large economy could hedge against the new threat by acquiring between 500k and 1 million coins, and mining more. At $120 each this is pocket money to neutralize a novel threat.
Of course such an acquisition will quickly drive the fx rate up, perhaps into four figures. Still cheap for a CB to do this, especially as they can print fiat for their purchases!
How many CBs can do this though? One or two, then the strategy fails as the rate goes stratospheric...
China's knows its yuan will not be a reserve currency for a long time, especially since they had hyperinflation as recently as the 1940s. It takes a very long time to earn this type of trust from the rest of the world. They are amassing gold in record amounts, but what strategy is better than having the largest Bitcoin holding as well. If fiat fades, then they are in pole position for the rest of the 21st Century.
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While the US pushes Bitcoin away, China is grabbing at it... http://bitnodes.io/Largest concentration of nodes, and near-monopoly on ASIC production. |
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geeeeez, if a forum troll can wreak such havoc then ripple doesn't seem to be that much of a system, does it?
Trust really means trust. As long as you don't grant trust to someone you don't really trust with that amount of money, you'll be fine. The trust system is what allows you to be independent of the banking system if necessary, though it doesn't insulate you against inflation caused by central banks. Trust, just like love, is eternal only while it lasts  I guess that Mark Karpeles and Peter Vessenes trusted each other for a few months while their contract was drawn up and signed. |
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It's one of two things that would help mitigate the problems. The other is an alt-coin that controls its own money supply to keep its value pegged to a fiat currency - a kind of parallel crypto-dollar.
That could be Liberty Reserve? Perhaps that is the best quasi-crypto version of the dollar (also a euro version exists, I think). |
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Excellent idea! One important project is closer to home. Which is funding etotheipi's trust-free lightweight node proposal for improving Bitcoin. I would vote with coins for an implementation which achieves the goal of this: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=88208.0 |
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