Unfortunately we must understand that  nowadays bitcoin is not the appropriate way for micropayments. In the future, if segwit will be activated and LN is settled maybe this will be a better and cheaper way for all of these transactions. If not, and the debate between blocksize and segwit supporters never ends, the interested with cryptos user have to use another way. He can use an altcoin instead of bitcoin like as the litecoin.

At first, I don't address the moral and criminal part of doing something like that but I claim only that bitcoin is the worst case scenario for this 'job'. Initially you need one who will accept the usb flash drive to be a 'hard' tech-savvy user. Furthermore, you have to somehow give him the private keys or the seed. Finally, if you believe that using bitcoin will prevent your anonymity and cover your tracks because you think that bitcoin is an anonymous and untraceable way for illegal activities then you will have to reconsider your decision because bitcoin has nothing of these features. So, if you insist to go, then cash i.e fiat or another crypto currency like as monero or zcash.

I read carefully the answers and views of Lee had given and I would like to ask your opinion of the following,

1. It seems to me that bitcoin miners keep a wait and see policy because they want to see what would be happened if LTC segwit is activated.
2. It seems strange to me that Lee said about some pools are forcing bitcoin devs for hardfork. If the profit is the main incentive for miners what is the meaning to do a hardfork with bigger blocksize? Of course every block will have more transactions but with lower fees so the sum after every block mining will be the same more or less but hardfork is more dangerous than soft one(speaking about the reputation and price of the coin). So, why Lee told something like that? In addition, why bitcoin miners want hardfork solution, given that anything told Lee is truth? Or he has any political or financial motivation?

Of course like is the situation currently none will use the bitcoin network if he buys a cheap drink because he is not willing to pay high fees. But if he wants to send money in another place or want to buy something from online store then bitcoin is the best solution. There are also cases, although it is not the norm, where some clever entrepreneurs offer better prices if you buy something with bitcoins than another online payment because if customer uses paypal or web banking sellers are paying fees to bank or paypal. The way I see it after some years from now when the incentive of mining blocks in the future will be very small or almost negligible only the tx fees will be the main source of profit for miners.

Of course for this type of transactions like as the subscriptions at any time  bitcoin is the best payment system. I usually pay my subscription to the file hoster; not every month because I prefer the gigabytes plan but from time to time. One year ago I used paypal but if you use the bitcoin once then you forget the other ways of payment. Really, is not only very fast but when the price of bitcoin has already increased like it is now you can see the difference in converting from fiat because you spend less bitcoin than usual.

Really? If you like this idea of 'security' and 'bank advantages' I cannot understand why do you use bitcoins. Maybe you use it as commodity or as asset. So why do we need decentralization and blockchain and miners? Why not a 'secure' centralized blockchain of a bank without any debate about blocksize or segwit and so on. That means, another form of fiat; no the paper one but the digital fiat. To summarize do you really believe that banks are more secure than the bitcoin network? So why not to go with RScoin

You can go with electrum if you like or any other desktop wallet, because you have the full control (private keys) of your bitcoins. Using a web wallet even though its creators claim otherwise they have the full control. If you like to use a personalized custom address that is a vanity address then you must do some research because there are different ways some free some not also some are secure and some also not but if you like to dive this a very good thread in the forum to start https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=25804.0. 

To my point of view some decades will pass before people come around to use only bitcoin and other crypto instead of fiat for many reasons. Many people, I am one of them I have taken a loan from bank which will hopefully  the last repaid end of 2024. Till then bank owns my house. Moreover, even though I live in Europe and there are some shops happily accept bitcoin unfortunately all utility bills have been paid only with cash or credit cards that is, fiat and banks. So, nowadays, is only a dream or utopia if someone believes he can lives without bank transactions and fiat. Of course these can be restricted only to the absolutely necessary transactions.

Do you really believe that bitcoin users have tremendously increased last two weeks? And what is the site which will crash? And you assure other users that their transactions will be confirmed? Can you clarify when? After a day, or two because after 72 hours the mempool will drop the unconfirmed transactions. I can't believe that last weeks so many people suddenly they loved bitcoin and as dedicated users they do everyday so many transactions. Obviously is a spam attack again; but I really cannot understand what the attackers believe eventually that they will succeed. 

You will read many opinions; at first, because any opinion is free and secondly is easy for everyone to give you one. From my point of view not all eggs in one basket. As you said in the recent past you invested some fiat to monero and eth. That's a good movement and maybe you could invest again some in other altcoins after your own research. As far as the bitcoin I agree that it's an investment in the long run because is the leader and has the biggest user base. As regards the price depends what means the long run for you. Nowadays taking into account the prices all of these years anybody will say that is high but when price was about $600 and doubled people said the same thing. The final decision is always yours

As every faucet is good for first time bitcoin users. I didn't try it as game so I can't speak about the gameplay but I believe there are better sites if someone wants to earn some satoshi's and learn many things related to bitcoin. One of them, even though currently I don't visit so often like I did in the past, is the 99bitcoins where anyone can earns some satoshis every 5 minutes and has the opportunity to learn about bitcoin while browsing the links of the very interesting site. On the other side, faucet users will find out what means 'dust' in bitcoin and how high the transaction fees are if they want to spend it.

Really? It seems that you live in USA or another rich country where the average citizen spends more than $100 in daily needs so you see it as a pennyworth amount of money. Have you ever think what is the $100 per month for many of the members of this forum? or how many countries belong to third world? For your information you could take a look at the GNI per capita . But even though you live in US this article, about 2 years ago, claims that about 1.65 million US households with children live with less than $2 per person, per day.

I believe that you are confused with the terms 'bitcoin' and 'bank'. You posted about bitcoin bank. But bitcoin is a decentralized p2p currency with no need of a third trust entity like as a bank, right? Or you want to say something like as anyone can deposit bitcoins and he can convert to fiat? But this is the same thing which is made by exchanges. So I really cannot understand what were you thinking when you  wrote  about a bitcoin bank. Can you clarify this meaning for me or can you post a link with this idea?

I cannot understand why you claim that fees range from exchange to exchange. If I'm not mistaken I believe is not matter what exchange anyone uses but what is the transaction size and how many are the unconfirmed transactions (network load), except if is a service which offered from some exchanges where customers pay a standard fee regardless the transaction size. Unfortunately, these days the fees are very high from 60-70 s/byte to 140-160s/byte if someone wants a next block confirmation.

I am very impressed not only because a well known business magazine devoted an article for Qtum but also how long an article most of his content about tech-savvies is. Maybe is the most complete with many details compared with the rest I have read until now. Moreover it's really amazing the strategic and financial backers who support the Qtum project; that means is very promising, revolutionary, innovative and of course profitable project for them. In addition I wonder what is the name of top accountancy firm which is hidden for now. Last but not least, what is the meaning, that is, what is the impact globally of what Dai said about the high demand of the 'Blockchain of China' ?

I really would like the creator of bitcoin to be a very advanced A.I even though it seems impossible to me. Say that it was an A.I can anyone imagine the potential of A.I's developers? On the other side if the claim of OP is real and an A.I in 2009 has created a revolutionary technology what this A.I had made nowadays? It's sure that he had settled the debate between blocksize and segwit supporters and the consensus would be a reality. So probably the bitcoin creator is not an A.I and we can continue to search the individual or group who developed it

Certainly nowadays the bitcoin's price is high and I wish to go even higher. But we have not forgotten that is a currency with small market cap and certainly easily can be manipulated after heavy speculation. What  anybody should do who believes in this currency is to be known and acceptable; the more people around the world because the more they use it the harder it is to be banned by any government. Hopefully devs, miners and nodes reach to a consensus because the very high fees with so many unconfirmed transactions every day is pain in the ass.

Trump spoke about safe zones obviously because he does not want Syrian immigrants to travel  in America. As has been shown so far, Trump is one unpredictable man, where nobody knows what he intends to do. But he has already talked with Russians as Moscow has acknowledged, therefore he knows their views. He doesn't even care what wants the American system, nor what Erdogan wants, but only what he wants. About the issue of Syria is clear, he wants to destroy the jihadist terrorists in cooperation with Russia (and obviously Assad). Also he has said he does not want changes in leadership in other countries. Eventually he has said at times a lot of conflicting statements, so let's wait for his actions.

From my point of view, as some members above with bigger experience than mine they posted that, LN does not solve the problems of spam and malicious users; franky1 highlighted it. On the other side as OP mentioned the LNs more or less will reduce the on-chain transaction per user. But LN like as any other solution, good or bad is a choice and not an obligation; again franky1 stated. Therefore, some people maybe will never use the LNs, for any reason they want; but is a choice for them who want to use it knowing their pros and cons which nowadays is unavailable. Therefore, without many theories, if we want to count the reduction cost we must see it practically in everyday real time usage.

Of course the lack of stores accepting bitcoin as payment is a problem but the way I see it it is not the only one. I believe it is more serious problem when we need a fast confirmation and we have to pay the high transaction fees which make prohibitive the usage of bitcoin as a means of payments especially when we need to buy something very cheap. So, till scaling issue would be settled with one or other way and fees are not so high I am almost sure most of the people will use it only as commodity