The revolution from traditional paper offices to digital offices wasn't hindered by notions of data stored in binary format not representing real information. There's no big advantage in shunning digital data formats over a paper trail. Most monetary transactions are conducted across electronic networks. Claiming that bitcoin doesn't represent real money isn't so different from saying a credit or debit card isn't real due to it containing magnetic data stored on a card format.

There are advocates calling for a cashless society proclaiming electronic transactions the future of business and world economies. If indeed electronic money is the future, can bitcoin participate in the discussion? The divide between what some deem "actual information" and digitized or electronic money is an interesting dualistic paradigm. There are physicists who claim the world we live in is a hologram or simulation.

I think that in a world where people want actual information they might revert to ahmish living conditions and shun electronic devices. That may represent the end game of real currency advocates.

Bitcoin hasn't been around for many years, yet it may be fair to say its price has a tendency to peak towards the end of the year during the holidays. This could be due to seasonal demand, black friday & christmas sales. If the consensus price reaches $10k (bitcoin is trading as high as $18,500 on some african exchanges) it could stay $10k throughout 2018. A big part of the equation is how many users bitcoin has, how many users it will gain and how many users it is engineered to handle.

The respective price surge and bitcoin bandwagon hoppers appear to be drowning out notions of btc being a bubble at the moment. There is a danger bitcoin could become a bubble if its value becomes disproportionate to its fundamental metrics. One thing which reduces the likelihood of it becoming a bubble is its price hike being driven more by demand than market manipulation or gimmicks. A case could be made for bitcoin's rising value being fueled by fundamental market forces. This could imply the massive spike in value is sustainable and will continue into 2018.

Steve Wozniak (apple co founder) said something interesting in an interview recently. He said humanity will invent better and more efficient methods to harvest gold from the earth's crust. Bitcoin's algorithmic method of limiting its own production has superior chances of maintaining a constant rate of supply.

The real test of gold is whether society can realistically revert to a gold standard in cases of emergency. If a zombie apocalypse occurred tomorrow, would gold emerge as a preferred coin of exchange across remnants of civilization? There are clips on youtube where people walk the streets attempting to sell $1,000 of gold or silver for $50. No one takes them up on it. The concept of gold and its value as a currency may be too neglected within the public eye to be an emergent currency in times of distress. Not only is support for gold exchange non-existent, its utility as a means of exchange may be a lost lore similar to the recipe for making roman concrete or damascus steel.

Golds best hope may be a form of gold renaissance, a resurgence of interest driven by fears relating to fiat hyperinflation. This is occurring in some circles. Preppers, doomsdayers and post apocalyptic planners are all stocking up on precious metals. What gold lacks in bling power and excitement it could more than make up for in endurance.

From my posts on this forum, it might be obvious I favor bitcoin over gold. But even I don't forget gold was here millennia before anyone knew what bitcoin was, and may be around millennia after bitcoin is lost and forgotten.

I don't want to flat out say you're wrong. You're trying to think critically, independently on your own. I strongly approve of that.

The best analogy I can think of is to cite how effective a automobile tire would be if it were made of glass. How efficient would a powerline be if it were made of wood? Our economic and financial systems have a certain degree of systemic efficiency or inefficiency. In cases where systemic inefficiency rises high enough, the system fails. Paying high taxes and having a large portion of that wealth be destroyed by inefficient budgeting/spending is the same as the Joker in the Dark Knight lighting a pile of money on fire.

This is an analogy for inefficient spending by big government.



Over the long run it doesn't matter if fiat is backed by physical goods or gold. Systemic inefficiency makes the status quo unsustainable. When the united states spends $6.5 trillion dollars on war, it needs positive tangible gains to show for it. Else, it could be categorized under destruction of wealth. The same with healthcare. Americans passed 20 tax hikes spending $2 trillion on the affordable care act. Were there many positive tangible gains to show for it? Spending trillions of dollars to fix things that never get fixed, catches up with even the richest nation on earth, eventually.

It can be virtually impossible to ID people electronically over the internet as a small business. There are websites which make it easy to buy fake inexpensive ID's of decent quality. Loans have historically been a rough area where crypto has had trouble. For crypto loans to be viable perhaps a collateral based system would need to be implemented. Or a better system of user authentication with a reliable means of debt collection in cases where borrowers refused to pay their debts.

It could also be possible to implement a fractional system where only a small percentage of the total amount a person wants to borrow was credited at a time, with them being required to pay back a certain percentage before they could receive more credit. Loan requests made via TOR/VPN/PROXY could be instantly voided which might cut down on fraud. Also loan requests made from countries which do not extradite.

According to israel one of the best methods they have to prevent terrorists from entering their country is to do in depth inquiries into what those entering the country plan to do once they get there. An indepth inquiry into what people plan to do with loans might likewise yield good reliability. Scammers may be too lazy to do research to come up with good backstories for how they plan to use their loans and perhaps also, how they plan to pay them back.

I would like to make a case for bitcoin not being expensive to use.  

There's a 9% to 14% sales tax in some US states. This implies that if a person makes a $100 purchase, their sales tax could be $9 to $14. Purchasing something that costs $100 in bitcoin and paying xfer fees is much cheaper than a $9 to $14 sales tax in fiat.

In europe, there is something called a VAT (value added tax) which is like their equivalent of the sales tax the USA has. The VAT can go as high as 20% on goods and services which qualify. 20% is a far more massive value than the cost of bitcoin transfer fees.

One might make a case of the euro and dollar charging far more in sales tax and VAT (which are almost like fiat transfer fees) than the cost of using bitcoin.

Like some said above, a lot can happen in fifty years. We could conceivably see quantum computers and quantum level encryption deployed within that timeframe. From history we can see that some inventions withstood the test of time. The mousetrap was invented in 1897 by James Henry Atkinson and is still in use today. It is plausible that bitcoin could have longevity due to it having limited supply which could allow it to retain its long term value better than alts with variable supply. Currencies with variable supply are prone towards being overprinted similar to fiat which could be a negative precedent over the long term. Bitcoin also may have better decentralization and development support. Bitcoin has advantages over other alts which could allow it to prosper and maintain its role as king of the crypto mountain over the next 5 decades.

Historically, there hasn't been much incentive for banking or financial sectors to produce innovation or progress. There may be a better likelihood of open source movements, independent developers or hobbyists producing whatever historical innovations we'll see in digital transactions over the next 50 years, than any real progress from the establishment or banks.

Rolando Dy is in the news. He says the UFC cut him from the roster after his 2nd loss. He gave up on fighting & thought his career was over. Then 3 weeks before this shanghai event, the UFC called Rolando Dy asking him to step in for an injured Pinghyuan Yu. Dy cut 30 pounds in 3 weeks to make weight. I hope the UFC keeps Dy around, I think he's talented and he can fight.

Bisping got KO'ed but I think he has made some improvements in his game. A lot of people might not like Bisping but I like the way he worked hard and never complained. It took Michael Bisping 10 years fighting in the UFC before he got his title shot. A lot of UFC fighters appear to want to quit if they don't get a title shot in only 1-2 years.

I kind of blame MMA Lab or the poor performance of Alex Caceres and a lot of the people who train at the lab. Wish I had placed a bet on Alex Garcia. A lot of people might think Muslim Salikhov is a great wrestler due to him being from dagestan and there being a massive amount of top level wrestlers from dagestan fighting in the UFC. Looking at Saklihov's competitive background, he doesn't have much wrestling experience and Garcia was able to capitalize on it.

The yuan has replaced the "petrodollar" in both russia and china. Oil buying/selling in those countries was once denominated in us dollars, this is no longer the case, the yuan has taken over there. Also china proposed a program to allow the yuan to be exchanged for gold. Depending on implementation details this could make the yuan a more gold backed currency than the US dollar, which could carry less support for gold exchange, and perhaps increase the yuan's perceived reliability.

China does appear to be taking steps to strengthen the yuan. This would benefit the people of china. Their consumer buying power would increase which could translate to elevated average standards of living. On the flipside, a stronger yuan could be bad for chinese exports as the private sector relies on units sold to make their profits.

This could help set the record straight on Bill Gates, who might be overrated. All of the following is true as far as I've been able to uncover.



Jeff Bezos has the potential to be a smarter and better tech CEO than Bill Gates, Steve Jobs or either of the google founders. The innovations Bezos made to amazon don't only amount to business models, or cutting middle men out of the equation as with walmart. I think Bezos has made significant contributions to amazon's tech policies and even their software engineering process, which have helped make it the dominant power it is today.

Also for those who were early adopters of amazon's stock, they received massive percentage gains on their investment similar to what early adopters of bitcoin enjoy. If you look at amazon's stock price history, it has sustained massive percentage growth over the years which is very impressive.

Amazon's stock opened @ $18. Today, its worth almost $1,200 nearly 100 times its initial value!



From october to november (2017) it gained almost 20% in value!

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I still think replacing the dollar or paper currency with bitcoin is not the best idea.

There are certain roles in which paper money is more efficient in comparison to electronic money.

Economies need things like yard sales and second hand markets for cars, bikes, motorcycles, boats, clothes et al. Cash is the most efficient and best method of fueling things like yard sales and the buying/selling of second hand goods.

People might consider how they would sell their used car, used computer or 2nd hand goods if cash were outlawed. Its much easier to sell something for paper fiat than it is to sell something for bitcoin.

I think that when JP Morgan says there could be a future in blockchain. What they mean is, there is a possibility create their own altcoin which is exactly like fiat in every possible way. The centralized mentality and business model of banks may be incompatible with true crypto currencies which utilize decentralized design and power structure.

Bitcoin has built a sterling reputation for producing long term value and reliability. Central banks could use that reputation to push their wealth redistribution, profiteering campaigns by building unreliable, regulated, systems using blockchain technology. One might compare it to ethereum which many believe to be stable and reliable as bitcoin, despite ethereum being far more like a fiat currency which can be printed ad infinitum into hyperinflation.

Blockchain technology may also be more affordable and easier to deploy than traditional electronic banking systems. It could boast higher reliability. There are reasons which make blockchain an attractive design from an engineering and business model standpoint.

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I would be curious to know if its possible to drop the 9% minnesota tax by taking a trip across state lines & cashing out btc in florida, texas or another place that has no state income tax. Might it be possible to cross the border into mexico and cashed out their btc, then pay out whatever mexican taxes were to avoid american taxes. I get a feeling all of the methods I mentioned would not work. But it is interesting to think about.

I think it may be legal to gift someone up to $14,000 in cash under tax free conditions. Not certain if these liberties apply to bitcoin. But if someone gave $14,000 in bitcoin to their spouse there's a slight chance it could represent a loophole that would make it tax free. There may be other methods of utilizing legal loopholes to reduce the tax.

In my case HODL and taxes don't matter much. I think the approach I should take is to try to build long term value and not worry too much about the losses I'll probably take on taxes and whatever else.

It could be safe to say alts derive a massive and significant portion of their own value from bitcoin.

Under conditions of normal market activity, when bitcoin rises, alts often follow in its footsteps. When bitcoin fades, the value of alts often decreases across the board.

There are exceptions to this as when bitcoin's price faded and bitcoin cash's price increased dramatically. However, I think many of us will agree that does not represent conditions of normal market activity. But rather abnormal behavior.

Nikolai Nikiforov, the person making remarks about russia never legalising crypto, is a russian minister of communications and mass media.

Last I checked, communications and media don't have much to do with economic policy or financial planning.

Nikolai Nikiforov appears to be commenting on areas outside his expertise and knowledge. If Nikolai were commenting on the news media or internet infrastructure his comments might be legitimate. But as he's commenting on policies involving finance and economic matters it is possible that he's speaking his personal opinion on the topic, rather than what russia itself endorses as a state.

This is interesting and has potential to explain a lot about Craig Wright claiming to be Satoshi.


$300 million is a lot of money for a blockchain startup.

It is possible Craig Wright was paid $300 mil to pretend to be Satoshi. The rights and patents to blockchain technology could definitely be worth much more than $300 million dollars. Its not outside the realm of possibility that someone paid Craig Wright to pretend to be Satoshi in order to secure blockchain patents at a discount price.

If the topic is global currency reset. I don't see that as being a likely outcome.

Some say the united states is the most powerful nation on earth. What makes it powerful? What gives the USA political influence? The explanation may not be politically correct. But it may be fair to say the USA derives its political influence from having a rich economy and a powerful military. If this is true, a hypothesis may be drawn which says military power and wealth are a form of political power and that the people who hold the most wealth and military power have the most political influence.

The reason the above could represent a relevent point involves massive and widespread policies of wealth destruction across the globe. We may not be headed towards a currency reset. Instead it could be a program intended to destroy the wealth, defense and prosperity of the people in order to reduce the amount of political influence they wield.

I wish there was more discussion on these types of topics. What the world will resemble in a post crash era could be something worth discussing. Not only for the poor, but also for the wealthy who must be concerned if their wealth and political influence would be destroyed along with everyone else's.

That's an interesting perspective, OP.

I wish it were possible to know what bitcoin's price would be if no one had ever called it a bubble. Versus what it is, today.

Perhaps people have lost faith in financial and economic systems to a point where they no longer take it seriously when media spokespersons say things. There's a possibility predictions about bitcoin being a bubble only show systemic corruption and bias against independent movements against bitcoin, which may be transparent enough to drive its price higher as you say.

There are games almost identical to what you're describing.

http://secondlife.com

Second life doesn't have the widespread crypto support you're describing, it only includes support for bitcoin.

Everything else you described fits it near perfectly.

With bitcoin and climate change the main issues are #1 emissions and #2 carbon sequestration.

There has been a shift towards so called renewable energy which is promoted as being environmentally friendly. This negates bitcoin's electrical consumption to a good degree.

The main issue with climate change involves 80% of the world's natural forests being cut down. Trees naturally store (sequester) carbon. The destruction of forests reduces the planet's ability to store carbon emitted into the atmosphere.

Another major issue is a large percentage of rainfall being produced by forests. Water is pulled from the earth and evaporated through the leaves of trees/plants. This produces rainfall. Cutting down large swaths of forest reduces water which would normally be evaporated which in turn produces drought.

The only legitimate methods of addressing climate change are afforestation programs. Seed bombing. Fighting desertification. Basically planting trees and protecting rain forests.