http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/pay-another-way-bitcoin/

The Wordpress guy pretty much got it actually, the status quo is if folks in my nation, and many other third world nations wanna pay for, let's say a wordpress or megaupload subscription, or just simply buying goods in a U.S online store, soon they will find many of the times their only option is to ask people like me(oversea students/workers) to help them out, all current payment methods would not work for one reason or another. Credit cards issued in many nations are not accepted, you can't blame the merchants for this, the issuing banks most likely would not give a shit once you are frauded, let alone pay for your losses, and even if you could locate the fraudster, the chance of a successful prosecution is superslim.  Paypal does not do business with perhaps more than half of the world's population, and is not allowed to process foreign currency transactions in China, even in those nations it operates, there are very often draconian restrictions, see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal#Local_restrictions , the chance that other online payment business/digital currency issuers could operate where Paypal could not is, of course, even slimmer. And don't get me started on the wire transfer, even if the merchant accepts it and you are fine with the exorbitant fees, your fund could be intercepted anytime by an intermediary bank if the amount is slightly large, on the pretext of financial crime prevention of course, and you are left to find out yourself why your fund has not arrived, no one is going to inform you, i had personal experience with that.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, could prove to be very useful, I don't know about other nations, but in China, it's a piece of cake to buy bitcoins with existing domestic online payment system like Alipay, even if the government decides to crack down on the exchanges, the online shops could still sell them under all kinds of pretenses, it is nearly impossible the authority would find out what is the good really being delivered. On the oversea merchants side, all they have to do is to use a payment processor, which adds very little cost. Of course, whether bitcoin could really succeed will have to depend on the size and liquidity of the market, in the end.

Bitcoin, it seems to me, is basically a digital version of hawala http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawala, except that hawala is nowhere near as versatile as bitcoin is. The decentralization aspect is not just libertarian ideology, it's very tangible in nations where financial barriers are real.

This is not a serious analysis thread, some chest-thumping is allowed I think? OK, what I really meant to say is: we had quite a few dumps of 40-50K size which were also much more fierce yet the market did not yield, if someone saw a slow-motion 10k-20k dump and decided it's time to jump on the boat, then it's tuition fee paid.

It's exactly because you are living in the first world, that you may not understand why the rest of the world needs it, and its uniqueness.

Bears never learned the lesson, if you want to kill the rally, prepare at least 100k-150k BTC for the dump, otherwise it's just a fire sale.

I don't think many of you guys in first world have fully appreciated the importance of these sites accepting bitcoins.

It may just be that no one wants to be the first, bulls or bears. Bears apparently got scared by the Thursday trap, and bulls are suspicious whether the rally could continue, so they just lay up high walls and play defense.

It's FUD or they can hold until the price rises up again and start bragging.

OK, let me give my analysis: Price stops moving=nobody wants to buy/sell=nobody is using/wants to use Bitcoins, so it's a bearish signal, SELL!!

I like bears who just can't wait to tell everyone after they sold their bitcoins like it's them losing their virginities.

There is but one form of transaction the government would be happy to let you conduct: the one that is easily traceable and stoppable by the authority, whereas there are almost an infinite number of mediums that could be potentially used as cash, and Bitcoin is cash's ultimate reincarnation. Moreover, cash is not going to die because governments brainwash their people to believe it's unnecessary and evil, you'll almost always spontaneously turn something into cash when you really need it.

I beg to differ here. I think the number of "healthy investors" could match that of reckless investors who would be deeply in debt and panic sell to cut losses, so the healthy guys could easily stop the price from falling that low by buying off at a higher, though still quite low bottom price(e.g. $7.22),  if the reckless investors were such a  dominant force here, their collective buying power would already have pushed the price way higher than it's now, like in June 2011, when the price jumped 20 dollars in just one week.

Yup, Finally Kim Dotcom could spend his Bitcoins to troll on Reddit! The market is expanding.

Say that again to me when his greenback loses half of its value.

Random wild speculation:  the price flattened out for a long time at about $13.5, now it is at $27, almost exactly twice as much, so maybe it's gonna cease to fluctuate for a while? What do you guys think?

so bored

You can get a list of all the orders executed, but you don't need them to know the  volume above $30, so why?

What about bragging rights? To your children/friends:" I was part of the whole revolution, I saw history unfolding right in front of me, and I can sign a message to prove it."

I am not going to use a bot, damned Gox is clogged enough already, bots activities only slow it down even more,  I think Gox should restrict the number of reuqests that can be made from a particular IP.

Edit: Oh, they won't, they love active bots coz more minutetradings means more fees for them, damn them!

Bears have not yet recovered from the shock of Thursday.

I think someone is trying to use Mt.Gox as a escrow service.