just use the governments own statistics against them.

in the last 4 years, millions upon millions of dollars have been seized in relation to drug offences.. in the same time............. 11btc have been seized

simple sweet and to the point, just like how google v1.0 use to be when everyone loved it.

although im not american i have tossed around the idea in different threads that instead of one company paying millions of dollars for every state, they set up franchises under a group name.

for instance lets use bitinstant name as an example.

instead of the three main CEO's paying all the licences. they take on 50 franchisee's to own the territory of the state they are from. the franchisee's pay for the licence of that state and get to do business within that state and obviously when all 50 states are licenced can work together with their colleagues in other states to cover the whole country.

then things like bitinstant ATM's can easily be introduced as the licences already exist and each state franchise maintains, installs, and monitors the ATM's within their state.

then things like bitinstant debit cards can easily be introduced as the licences already exist, and each state franchise maintains and distrubutes cards to customers within that state.

then the bitinstant customer service can become local so business and customers can contact someone within their state.

this can expand on to other things like bitinstant courier services where each franchise is a bitinstant distribution centre for that state.

the list of possibilities can expand where each element(state) works together due to being under the same umbrella, while keeping costs for individual franchise business owners low.

why have 50 companies all needing 50 licences (2500 licences) when they can all work together.

lastly people may say 'but this is not decentralised.

well, bitpay, bips, campBX, bitstamp may start a franchise scheme to reduce costs and compete, . all opening franchises under their own umbrella brands. that way its not one company monopolising the market. but still having all the FIAT side of regulation covered. aswell as having 'staff' nearby the state involved with certain transactions to keep everything maintained.

when accepting visa/mastercard you have no choice but to use a card processing service to ensure transactions complete. you can set up a system where you accept bitcoins and then pay them as wages to employee's thus making it fee free.

you could take your bitcoins, find a localbitcoins trader and transfer to fiat that way, thus being fee free. bitpay is just a optional extra, not an essential tool to transact with bitcoins.

there are far more ways to accept bitcoin for free and still get your FIAT. atleast your not stuck with card processors and forced to pay upto 3%.

i would however agree that the transaction fee's added to bitcoinQT client transactions should not exist just yet. as the 25 bitcoins shared amongst hundreds of miners is more then enough. the combined quarter of a bitcoin for transaction fees shared between the same miners is not really a noticable 'bonus'... yet from the people using bitcoin the transaction fee's are noticeable.

EG 25BTC/100 miners = $22
0.25BTC/100 miners=22c

i dont think its over valued.

put it this way. even though theres 7 billion people in the world. lets bring those numbers down to something more along the lines of minimal users right now.

lets say there are 1 million users.

we know theres many people (winkle twins) that invested millions into it. but lets keep things simple. lets say that every one of those 1 million people on average just invest 1 months wage... yep thats right, not their whole life savings. just one month wage..

1million x £$1000 = £$1billion

so even with this small amount of userbase and the small amount of average investment.. i think the valuation is not over valued at all..

if you did not mean financial value but feature and usability value. i can name you many gimmicks/items that only have one function that people value more then their pets, children and relationships.

i guess you ignored the 20k+ LEGITIMATE businesses that have found bitcoins cheaper then accepting credit cards

i guess you ignored the many more legitimate bitmit independant traders selling t-shirts, GPU's finding bitcoins irreversibilty a benefit, compared to ebay chargeback scams when listing items

i guess you ignored the fact that i went on vacation and found getting foreign currency from a localbitcoin trader, easier and faster then transfering FIAT to a travel currency exchange shop.

what i do find strange is.. i find ants and bugs useless to my life.. yet i do not sign up to a insect forum posting hundreds of posts saying how useless they are........ but you are here???

if its so useless to your life, why make it part of your life to become emotional about it enough to write these messages?

if this is suppose to be a thread to cause people to think bitcoin is useless..

i personally think bitcoin does not have one sole purpose but many, many micro purposes, that can fit the needs of many people for many different reasons

for example

why do you need shares in companies like apple? - to make profits
why do people need google news when a physical newspaper already exists? - because there is a limit to how much you can hold onto in one go with paper
why do people need to send SMS instead of posting a stamped envelope? - because travelling distances takes time compared to instant communication

now
why invest in bitcoins - to make profit
why use digital currency over paper FIAT - because there is a limit to how much you can hold onto in one go with paper
why dont you just send paper FIAT by post - because travelling distances takes time compared to instant communication

now lets add onto this list of real life things that exist which compare to the benefits of bitcoin.

agreed, but bitcoin can be used as the stepping stone to release 100% control and dependancy on government. even if it is 10%, then using other projects such as new hampshire project where all the businesses in the town accept this one currency to allow people to live on non FIAT based lifestyles meaning wages are paid in bitcoin. as oppose to just using bitcoin for occassional transactions/investments. bringing government control down to 80%, then self funding of the towns resources through rent / local utility bills only(higher rent of course to cover the road maintenance of the roads the houses sit along). and not tax a separate tax, thus all the funds stay within the community.

slowly dividing the need of government control down, one % at a time

although finshaggy's idea of utopia was ... well .. i cant put into words how much fail it was.. but if those that truly want a utopia

instead of diluting all of these idea's into micro projects all over the world. how about combine them with existing idea's..

EG new hampshire project.

its better to have a great area like new hampshire with so many inspirational things happening, and legal stuff ALREADY in the pipeline instead of  having millions of coins 'wasted' on half baked idea's spread out and having to start new legal stuff in different area's which simply wastes the funds.

make new hampshire the prototype area for everything. and once its successful it can spread like wild fire. much more simply then 'wasting' smaller amounts on micro projects scattered around where they become useless.

the UK's faster payment system is exactly this, it works well and the recipient see's the money in seconds, which has been one less benefit of bitcoin over here. hense why its a struggle to promote bitcoin in the Uk to mainstream.

if america starts offering it, then you will see americans see bitcoin as less of a benefit. i believe the american banks may be trying to think of ways to keep people interested in institutional banking, so of course they wont mention bitcoin. they dont want to advertise the alternative which they are trying to prevent users from switching too.

it's definetly something american bitcoiners need to keep an eye on

well that would be the same guide all noobs to bitcoin should use, not just deceased families

same with writing in a will the keys to my safety deposit box containing 1 billion dollars in bearer bonds is located under the fishtank..

if it suddenly disappears after death atleast the police have something to go on...

(thinking for 2 seconds)
i have came to the conclusion this is yet another prequel scare tactic the OP may be dreaming up to then offer a dead-man switch service to contact family, offer them advice on how to reclaim bitcoins, only if the bitcoins are held in trust by him lol..

there's atleast a dozen of these brain farts tried out over the last few years.

but the simple solution: put enough info in the Will to find a paper wallet without actually putting the paper wallet in the will..

if its above $100, use btc-e.com.. theres no fee

put it in your will. and treat the paper wallet exactly like a bearer bond, store it safe and just put its location  in the will

obviously if the funds disappear after you decease but before the family gets to hear the will, you know the lawyer pre-read the will and emptied the private key of the separate paper wallet (bearer bond) dry.

also to add:

do a simple Who-is search for m-banco.com

Creation Date: 27-feb-2010
   Expiration Date: 27-feb-2014

i cant see he had the idea before 2010..

guess the OP hasnt checked out the 12,000 plus food merchants, the hundreds of bars, pubs, etc. the cafe's etc all accepting bitcoin.

should we treat this as bad on him for not exploring beyond the front page of this forum. or blame ourselves for not publicising all the businesses to make people aware they exist

i have spend my hoard 3 times over, i just have knowledge and experience to recoup my hoard

but the simple point is unless there is a variety of ways for people to decide to spend their coins directly, eventually 21 tonnes of mannure can be worth more to farmers then 21 million bitcoins. because mannure has a multitude of uses.

so we really need a retail push and a slowdown on the mining publicity. many noobs come into bitcoin thinking they can turn their gaming machines into millionaire makers. this is not the case.

in the real world the richist ppeople are not gold barons digging for gold, that was so 19th century. now the richest people are people like the walmart family, microsoft, apple. the people that have product to sell.

knowing that someone is spending is not as important. knowing there are many places to spend them on and that people can generally live some form of life on bitcoin is more important.

i think a push to get entrepreneurs away from mining projects and into retail projects is the way forward. there is still a lack of grocery food and standard (non gimmicky) clothing that needs to be filled for bitcoin to be considered an everyday use item.

Compu-Global-Hyper-Mega-Net

might be worth adding your website to your profile. so that people can come visit and spend coins with you once live