ok lets imagine this as your strategy
2016:
you act as a localbitcoin/zapo hybrid, people put bitcoins in. and your service converts them to fiat(like an automated localbitcoin system) and automatically loads the fiat to a virtual visa(zapo esq).
now.. at this stage knowing merchants are not being charged a transaction fee because thats the brave thing of NFC.... what are you going to do in 2017 to tempt businesses into accepting bitcoin direct, and then converting it to fiat afterwards..........

coz so far all i see is a faster system than localbitcoins/xapo.. where its all automated. which is great because bitcoin users can catch the train without having to log into localbitcoins and manually barter a deal with a bitcoin buyer, minutes before the train leaves the station.. and great for going to starbucks to spend bitcoin without manually bartering bitcoin deals whilst in the coffeeshop queue.. but thats still not solving getting retailers to know about and use bitcoin direct.

so tell me more about your 2017 plan.. for bitcoin retail acceptance (not fiat conversion prior to sale)

ask yourself. what can you do in the real world to earn FIAT..

now put that same answer to bitcoin.

hint: get a job

for all these sig campain abusers. who spend all their waking hours making comments just to get $15 a week.. how about put ur C.V into all these 100,000 bitcoin businesses, asking to be customer service reps, replying to queries.. and earn yourself more than $15 a week..

now most jobs you would get $300 for 40 hours at $7.50.... which is better pay then 80 hours of forum abusing for signature commissions... and the best thing is..
if your happy doing 80 hours for $15.. then offer 40 hours of your life for anything above $15, so both you and employer profit..

imagine we kept to a 2cent tx fee..
right now with a total 4200tx per block limit(1mb). the max tx income for solving a block is $84.00
if the block limit is raised to 20mb, the max tx income possible per block is $1680
if the block limit is raised to 32mb, the max tx income possible per block is $2688

so based on limits proposed and known about in the next decade $2688 is the top miner income, where users wont be too upset to pay a fee..
sooo. although tx fee's wont really be fully essential in the next decade. it is something to think about in the 15+ years, when there is only 1mill coins left to mine.

so lets think about the yearly income of miners solving 32mb blocks.
$2688/block=$387072/day=$141,281,280/year

at a $141million potential income stream per year.. even 3 farms spending $20mill each on equipment can still make $27mill profit each per year..
which will keep difficulty high as there is soo much equipment hashing..

or on the flip side,

1 million people spending $60.00 each, will get $141.00 in return($81 profit), each year.. which will keep the blockchain decentralised..
either way, there is still profit and incentive to keep doing it.


less miners means more slices of pie for those who remain..
yea we might see 10 farms turn into 3.. but either way it will still find an equilibrium where there are a nice amount of miners who can profit..

just remember it only requires 3 miners.. (big or small) to keep an honest system.. so relax you are thinking about problems decades away, which will naturally sort itself out by changing from different strategies for mining.. and as i said there is upto $141mill potential yearly income, so thats always going to be tempting

list of retailers/businesses using bitcoin..

bitpay/coinbase quotes that over 100,000 businesses are accepting bitcoin..

i dont think that user counts or address counts mean much.
after all 1 person can have 20+ addresses on average.
after all signature campains or adsense could send out microtransactions 1000 times a day to a single person..

thus addresses and tx's do not reveal anything useful, unless you can prove the context of each addresss/ tx used,

and that is why i only concentrate on how useful bitcoin is. by looking at how many businesses people can use..

my ultimate popularity neon flashing light moment. is when grocery stores accepting bitcoin have enough coverage that anyone in any town can buy their toilet roll and baked beans with bitcoin.

maybe trezor v2. will have the 'webwallet' on the device next time. that way it can auto run on offline computers without the need of web extensions or communicating to trezor server.

then your free to push the TX to any miner/network user you choose.

i think those believing trezor is infallible have never thought of a hacker tweaking the web extension to do man in the middle attacks..

bip32, is paperwallet brainwallet technology.. but thats separate matter, not about actively using the hardware wallet..

for instance you can stamp on a trezor and burn it.. but still have to use the paperwallet elsewhere.. the question the OP asked was.. USING trezor..
as an active device.. is it safe.

no.. the trezor key (pin code, not privkey seed.. but the set up pin) is uniquely linked between the device and trezors servers.
to USE the trezor device, you need browser extensions and access to trezors website..

again im not talking about the privkey seed wrote on paper, im talking about the trezor device..

well that was wishy washy of not answering..

so hello localbitcoin,xapo 2.0.. maybe worth you dropping the gimmick of 'retailers accepting bitcoin'..

as thats like saying my UK Visa debit is suddenly a mechanism for US retailers to accept pounds.. when we all know visa auto converts the currency so the retailer receives the dollars they want..

i think you would have more success just describing your business offerings honestly and correctly as all these gimmicky pretenses wont win you trust.
just stick to calling yourself a bitcoin debit card that converts to fiat... avoid trying to suggest retailers accepting bitcoin.. and you might have more fame by sticking to the true service offering..

have a nice day.

1) trezors key is uniquely linked to the device. and as such, is not the same as the brainwallet key
2) trezor works by linking to a computer, which links to the internet. which links to the trezor site. when disconnected.. its just a memor storage device, all transactions need to go through to trezor servers.. so although the likely hood of changing the firmware of the hardware wallet is impossible.. there are ways to hack the computer to change the 'bridge' broswer extention, or spoof the trezor site

.. that said, its much safer then just storing coins on blockchain.info coinbase.(if trazor never shutsdown)
but not as safe as using bitcoin core and setting the wallet.dat file to be on a memory stick

it actually works. not just for future consumers.. but for merchants too..

a few merchants are unsure of setting up bitpay/coinbase accounts. and what i found that really worked well was setting up a bartab.. prepaying the merchant a sum of fiat. and then set up the bitcoin accepting address service so that the merchant shows customers a bitcoin address.. and then later the merchant takes fiat out of the tab.. thus they know they get paid without question.. as they already have the money waiting for them..

plus they get to accept and play with the payment system at no cost.. just like tipping/faucets are suppose to achieve

only when their bitcoin usage grows. you introduce them to the other services like bitpay/coinbase to handle larger volume trades..

but inshort giving merchants an upfront financial gain to secure them and let them use/play for free. works

as you just said to unamis76..
it involvees them using your app.. where your company creates the smart contract (you create the multisig privkeys), and people deposit funds to these. hotwallets of yours..

so indeed seems much like localbitcoins.. although glossed over with 'smartcontracts' you also list traders who have the ability to fund virtual debit cards, which i presume you also manage within your app..

sooo,,,

im all for making the conversion to fiat more streamline. but not under false pretenses of pretending there is no middleman. and pretending the merchant is supposedly and suddenly a bitcoin receiver. as its obvious its still a fiat transaction they will get.

so dont worry about any presentation video showing some guy standing in walmart swiping his iphones NFC over the cashiers machine.. and then say "walmart accepts bitcoins". because it seems nothing is any different.

my last post is not about gimmicks or presentations to get people to put bitcoin into your app.. my last post was asking if you would actually get supermarket retailers to accept bitcoin direct from customers.. and then you (like bitpay/coinbase) handle the conversion afterwards..

because if not.. then your gimmicky pretense of getting merchants to accept bitcoin just fell flat on your face. as you might aswell call yourself localbitcoin 2.0

i think that spending more than 5c on any transaction is rediculous.. so lets use the 5c as a benchmark per tx.

now then a 1mb block has the potential of 4200tx per block. thus $210 MAXIMUM POTENTIAL income from a block of purely tx fee's
now then a 20mb block has the potential of 84000tx per block. thus $4200 MAXIMUM POTENTIAL income from a block of purely tx fee's
now then a 32mb block has the potential of 134400tx per block. thus $6720 MAXIMUM POTENTIAL income from a block of purely tx fee's

so there are the fiat totals.. but no one can know for sure what the bitcoin price will be in a few decades to equate that to a btc income..
but lets guess

$2,000/btc= total solving reward of 3.36btc per block (full 32mb), with an individual tx cost of 0.00002500/tx
$5,000/btc= total solving reward of 1.344btc per full 32mb per block (full 32mb), with an individual tx cost of 0.00001000/tx
$10,000/btc= total solving reward of 0.672btc full 32mb per block, with an individual tx cost of 0.00000500/tx

there's the maths.. enjoy your speculating

your service, is basically localbitcoins then.. but instead of wire transfers, its funding to a virtual debit card.. ok i get that part.
which is.. kinda ok, for people that want to use fiat retailers without the hurdles (hoping you have removed the hurdles localbitcoins has).

but i do not yet see your plan or business model showing us how you will get all these NFC fiat retailer to get onboard. so here are my idea's

1(a). virtual visa charge X% per transaction(merchant usually gets hit by that)
1(b). NFC merchants usually buy/lease the sensor equipment and need to subscribe to payment processor contracts.
1(c). you(PLUTUS) would take a cut somewhere in the middle either as a fee or by messing with the conversion value to bite out of the spread

so bitcoin user, paying bitcoin merchant can offer discounts because (a)(b)(c) wont be needed.
you(PLUTUS) can still make profit when the merchant wants to convert their received btc into fiat, so relax you still have a role.

2. to be considered a serious currency. bitcoin needs to be useful to buy toilet paper, baked beans, bread and milk..
so although using things like Dell, Overstock as prime examples of bitcoins validity. i think you need to get some of the grocery/supermarket chains onboard.
then transport networks.. then taxi's, and whatever else may use NFC.. (if NFC is what you are concentrating on)
which im sure your plan is.. afterall the NFC technology(face to face shopping locations) is useless to dell and overstock(remote shopping sites)
Walmart for instance would be the biggest shining light media attention for bitcoin, if they started accepting it.. then all the starbucks and other retailers would follow

over 100btc
over 5000ltc

but only because i been around since 2012 (when prices were lower)

totally agree. but i dont think spam bombing retailers is strategic.
research is needed.
1. how popular is this retailer to the bitcoin community. is there an actual usage need for bitcoin to be accepted by a certain number of people.
2. what is this retailers current payment method. do they accept more then just cash and credit.. EG paypal, applepay, foreign currency.
3. who within the company is the decision maker (Chief financial manager, payment processing manager, e-commerce chief)

what would need to be done is find the most popular retailers. and get people who would actually buy from that company to email the customer services of the company a basic request about accepting bitcoin.
next tally up all of these requests (getting users to post that they done it) and then make a formal communication with the decision maker using the stats that there is a demand for it.. using examples like Dell, and other well known retailers already taking it on.

contact coinbase/bitpay that this retailer has noticed a interest/demand for bitcoin acceptance and get advice on how to link coinbase/bitpay upto the retailer so they can organise getting the retailer set up.

i agree.

though i have (sneakily: not revealed) seen some potential.. i just want to hear some key words from Coin corner to see that they have not just grabbed numbers out of the air, and instead have done the maths (i secretly done but not revealed) to show how they can manage it..

im sorry but if u "dragon's den" your idea. here is what would be said.

Dragon:
"so 1% of £1mill of customer transactions is £10,000 net FEE income. my question to you is after 1 year you have made only £10k. with 6 employee's, what is your current financial status"

CoinCorner:
"well we paid out 6 employee's wages at an average £30k/year, so thats £180k wage spend. then their is the office, equipment and utility costs.. thats another £40k.. totalling £220k.. so take £10k income from the £220k outgoings and we are at about £210k debt"

dragon
"well i can see that you are in need of £300k to get out of debt and have some £90k surplus to expand. but tell me. how can you valuate your company at £4million, based solely on £10k income(before costs)"

CoinCorner:
"we hope to expand into europe and get 1million customers in a year"

dragon:
"ok 20,000 customers got you £10k. so a million customers gets you £100k.. of which you think we deserve only £6,710(6.71%) if we asked for that money before your own wages/office costs. because im pretty sure. that with £220,000 costs leaving you minus £120,000 we sure as hell wont see any return, if taken after costs."

another dragon:
"as investors we look to make profit within 3-5 years. which at 6.71% return, you would have to have received nearly £5mill in fee's or processed nearly £500million in customer transactions. can you actually see you scaling up from £10k fee's to £5mill fee's within 3 years"

third dragon:
"highlighting that 20k customers nets you £10k(before costs) that averages out to needing 10million customers to net you £5mill in fee's.. the simple question is. does the bitcoin UK/Europe community have 10million users to fill your earning requirements, as i dont think 1mill customers is enough"

................
and ill just leave it at that..

again in my eyes, bitcoin (the code, currency, network) needs no regulation.

businesses holding customers funds, whether it be bitcoin, fiat, or fairy dust... doesnt need regulation. (because current regulation is a false security).

take the banks.. they are supposed to be regulated. supposed to be insured.. yet when they went belly up in 2007.. they stole the insurance funds and then begged governments for more money..
and even after receiving all this money.. they have the gumption to say that the people now owe trillions in debt..

so regulation is meaningless.. especially as it only gives a shield to the business to continue dirty practices.

what is needed is a customer protecting insurance(not regulation prescribed insurance).. so when things blow up.. the business is not handed a cheque.. but instead the customer is.

its customer protections we need, not regulations that mess around with business, to cause headaches for customers. not delays in customer service just so that businesses can do shoddy things and get away with it.

take MTGox. took both fiat and bitcoin..
but because there is no insurance policy.. governments and other financial companies dont care, and the government is taking its sweet time doing anything raid out whatever reserves are found paying the government court and lawyer fee's leaving customers till last.

but imagine MTGox had insurance. MTGox would worry about stealing or filing bankruptcy because, although the insurance company would pay out to customers the minute a large scale theft/bankruptcy claim came to light.. that insurance company would then push real hard real fast for justice. harassing mtgox for answers.. and so both the customer gets reimbursed and mtgox would have a bigger nightmare to worry about. which may have been a scary enough worry for Kerpeles to not have done it in the first place.

after all.. without insurance.. he didnt have to worry about rich lawyers or government face slapping(or so he thought). he just thought bankruptcy was his get out of free card. and it took soo long and so much spending of customers potential reserves for him finally to be face slapped by government.

things would have been better, faster and easier if insurance companies were involved.. he would be in fuchu prison back in 2014, customers would have been reimbursed already.. or he would have seen the potential aftermath before it happened and just continued to run an honest (well it was in 2010-2012) system

i think what the OP is trying to say is that soo many people sit on their hands and shout,
when will bitcoin go mainstream
when will bitcoin get noticed
when will bitcoin reach $xxxx

well, bitcoin is just code.. it has no voice, no arms no legs..
its the community. (you and me) that are the voice, arms and legs.. so for those asking when.. the answer is when they help themselves.

a prime example is a guy asking when his local shop will accept bitcoin.. like it will magically happen.. if he wants his local shop to accept bitcoin, he the person in the town, using that shop should go and ask that shop about bitcoin.. as a stranger 1000 miles away wont do it..

i dont think businesses need to verify to some government, just to set up a business.. but...
.. but.. if they are going to request customers funds and store/lookafter/mange peoples funds (online wallets/exchanges/escrows) then they need to get some insurance, and publicize their financial liability (coverage). as a basic fallback for consumer protection should the company decide to try legging it.

anyone can make a business look legit by spending $£50 for a state registration/companies house listing... but when it comes to storing funds.. insurance and consumer protections means alot more then any crappy registration application..

as for government regulation.. HA!
the government sit on their hands and leave it for the company to do the reporting/crime solving.. the only time they get involved to slap a company is when they receive a certain amount of complaints, but by this time, its too late.. also regulation is limited to the law of the small city/state that the company decides to register to, meaning if you are european. and the company is american.. your european customer protection laws may differ to the laws of america. and the regulator will only deal with the american law.

so regulation is not really 'consumer protection' either.. only insurance is the sure fire way to get redress if a problem arises,
but yes nothing is perfect

tell us a bit about your friends.. that way you can point out aspects of bitcoin that will 'it home' with them.

eg.. there is no point telling them that bitcoin is better then western union. if your 3 friends will and have never used or needed western union..

also do you have enough bitcoin your willing to spend on the meal..? look for places in your area that accept bitcoin and show them you buying something with bitcoin.
look on the bitcoin jobs listings to see any available jobs where people are paid in bitcoin. that way you can cover all the bases of rebuttles that bitcoin is not as useful as fiat.

if your friends are investors.. then do the comparison to gold speech, with all the benefits of bitcoin (deflation, limited supply, cost of production rising(mining)) to point out the huge rise potential.