The article sounds like it's trying to create a conflict out of nothing.  What exactly is the practical basis of the conflict between Citi and bitcoin?

It's a way of effecting an economic transaction while leaving no trace of a financial connection between the participants.  Whether you want to call that laundering or not is beside the point.

As far as I can tell, there is no fundamental economic basis for the
current exchange rate.  There would need to be a compelling "medium of
exchange" usecase for bitcoin increasing widespread demand for it.
Absent such a usecase, I would expect the price drop to continue over
the medium term.

This is just speculation, but it seems like "medium of exchange for
illegal economic activity" was a compelling usecase, particularly since
if you mine bitcoins through tor, they presumably start life completely
anonymously.  But if this were the primary economic use for bitcoins at
the moment, it would have an unstoppable inflationary effect on bitcoins
relative to conventional currency, because most of the participants
would want to change their bitcoins out for conventional money as soon
as the exchange had been effected.  It would even be likely to drive the
exchange-rate/mining-difficulty ratio to completely unprofitable levels
for legitimate miners, because if your goal is simply a anonymous medium
of exchange, the electricity cost of producing bitcoins would simply be
a way of laundering money through the power company.  At any rate, this
usecase doesn't seem to have led to sufficiently wide adoption to
increase demand for bitcoins.

I thought it took about 10 minutes to fully verify a bitcoin transaction under normal conditions.  Are these transfers mediated through some kind of escrow service?

What's preferable about the sapphire over the diamond?

  Thank you.

Probably explained somewhere in this long thread, but I don't have time to search:  what do the staircases to the left and right mean?

  I watched the first 20 minutes and didn't see anything interesting.  Can you list some of the highlights you saw, and preferably say where they are in the (one-hour long) video?

It's for precisely this reason that bitcoin exchange/trading services make me nervous.

What's the total power draw/noise level?

Bitcoinica seems happy to act as counter-party.

  Thanks for the explanation.  I take it that, say, mining behind a tor exit node is not directly harmful at this stage?

I did, with the $1 Zhoutong gave me.  I got slaughtered.  Slaughtered, I tell you.

  I largely agree with your comment, but I'm curious as to what you mean when you say silk road went down.  Is the server no longer working?

Your post would be more convincing if it contained some evidence-based reasoning, rather than simply a string of unsupported assertions.  For instance, you claim that the downturn looks like a standard correction.  What is a standard correction, and why does this look like it?  Why does a "standard correction" imply price increases in the long run?

Can you expand on the network damage which could result from using Tor?  I am not familiar with the hidden services you're refering to.

Wow, $7.50/coin is a bit steep.

So, where does one learn apparently elementary things like "ground it with a paperclip to start the PSU?"

I was thinking about building a rig myself, but decided not to because I am concerned about the viability of the bitcoin market.  This thread is making me glad I decided not to simply because my knowledge of electronics is so rudimentary.

fivebells.  Thanks!

What is the best way to place a bet that BTC/USD will continue to drop, "best" in the sense of minimizing counter-party risk?  Bitcoinica is the obvious easy answer, but it makes me nervous.