That's true of buying into any investment. If you don't put the work into making estimates or at least guesstimates of an investments true value and potential then you deserve whatever happens to your money.

At the time of Gox my best guess was that the floor was around $125. I was prepared to buy more at each $100 mark and really press under $200. I missed a few marks as the price fell fast. And it never reached even close to my floor. I tend to be conservative as I like my money and I'm not greedy. I never cry about opportunity missed and try obsessively to understand what I missed when I make a misstep.

Patience, hard work and due diligence. And avoid blaming outside forces. The keys to success in anything.

I was going to write something lengthy addressing the many things I find offensive about this post. But I'm going to keep this short as you have already expressed a complete lack of interest in hearing from anyone who might offer information from the perspective of success.

You started your own business, for which I commend you. You give no information but it sounds like you were under capitalized and when a downturn occurred you could not ride it out. Did you study what had occurred or did you just blame the downturn?

You stated that you bought bitcoin near the peak. Had you done any research on what bitcoin was and how market forces work or were you just being led by the hype?

And now you state that you don't want to hear from any of the successful people. You are demanding to converse only with the losers.

Are you seeing a pattern yet? Most successful people start off making a lot of mistakes. The key is they analyze what went wrong and learn from them.

BTW, you haven't lost any money. Losing money occurs when you buy high and sell low. Until you sell you have only lost potential and it makes no difference where value is at a given instance as long as you don't sell. I'd advise buying more when it is lower (now) but you've already said that you invested your 'life savings.' You might also want to analyze that decision.

To what end? I didn't go all the way to the but I didn't see any ads to be clicked.
Sorry, I'm not very knowledgeable in this area.But always curious about everything.

http://thesproutstream.com/?p=31

I can't figure out if this is another program failing the Turing test, output from a much longer version of the Bitcoin Bullshit Generator or proof you should never post really really high.

Not a single sentence that is correct factually or syntactically.

Another Brand name merchant joins the fray.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/06/11/expedia-wants-you-to-book-your-next-hotel-stay-with-bitcoin/

http://www.coindesk.com/malaysian-online-retailer-accepts-bitcoin-wont-convert-fiat-currency/

“[I'm] looking forward to the new world of virtual payment choice, which I believe can be the future of global virtual currency that people might embrace, especially the Gen Y.”

“I am holding the bitcoin. Because having a very big confidence the price of bitcoin is not the rates of today USD 650, should be higher than this price very soon.”

Very nice to see a huge player have such confidence in the currency.

I haven't been on eBay in over a decade so things might have changed but how would letting the sellers accept bitcoin be any different from letting them accept MC/Visa as far as PayPal is concerned?

I'm not sure why but that really made me laugh. Thanks.

and the government fired him because that is their job.

While the blockchain protocol seems to contain all the needed functionality (not that I am even close to an expert) to make short and put options a reality as far as I know no exchange has yet implemented options. I've been waiting for this myself as I think it would remove a lot of volatility from the value of bitcoin by letting investors limit their exposure.

A lot of people that want bitcoin to only be a currency are against such features being developed. I think lowered volatility is vital to it being more accepted as a currency.

If I was a little more awake I would have noticed your user name 
Thank you for your swift answer. I've gotten pretty good at placing native language by unusual sentence structure, but I didn't have a clue here. Thank you for indulging my curiosity.

Back OT: having created a world changing technology I think he is entitled to whatever he can make from it. I don't see how his using it would destabilize bitcoin any more than any one else doing so.

Because a centralized decentralized monetary system makes no sense. And if they don't centralize it than it becomes difficult - other than by whatever initial coins they deem as theirs - to make a profit of it. And if they aren't doing that then they are just undercutting their other profit making mechanisms.

If they do try to profitize it than other alt coins make more sense and as the Fed's indirect regulatory power extends only to the US the other cheaper coins would flourish overseas and underground in the US.

Out of curiosity what is your native language?

No different than what they've been doing with offshore accounts for decades.

Okay, we build a device to turn the excess heat into electricity and using experimental "grounding" technology we funnel this electricity into the Earth to combat AGW.

I think I've covered all my green bases. Where do I collect my government grant funds?

Got to go, trying to think like a politician has giving me a headache.

That is not my area of expertise. I highly encourage those that are capable to help expand bitcoin's acceptance as a currency. However back in the current reality it is the investors that are driving the value. If bitcoin's value was still around $25 there would never have been the interest (good and bad) that has propelled bitcoin forward toward becoming a currency. Admittedly there is a potentially valid point of view that it has become too noticed too soon. But I'll leave that discussion for someone else.

I plan to do my part as an investor (not the same as a hoarder) and hope others take advantage of that raised profile to further position it as a currency. When it is advantageous beyond just conceptually to use it as a currency, I will do so.

But we all have our parts to play.

Have you noticed that more it is talked about, good or bad, the more folks have heard about it and more places start accepting it? Bad news always scares nervous investors (those that don't understand their investment) but this helps us to determine the true floor. Currently this appears to be around $400. That is up substantially from before this year of news coverage.

$100 in 2012 had the purchasing power that $3.48 had in 1900. A loss of 96.4% in buying power.

If you are in the group which treats bitcoin as a commodity, as an investment vehicle, which I think is by far the largest group for now until more of the marketplace begins to accept it, options become a great avenue for more people to invest.

All an option is is the option to buy or sell at a set price within a set time frame. It's a bet placed against someone else willing to make the opposite bet. But the effect it has is being able to limit your risk. So if a person is staying away from bitcoin because he has been told it could be worth nothing tomorrow, this is a way for him to invest without that concern. Once he has done this a few times he might have enough confidence in bitcoin to buy some for real.

Options have nothing to do with derivatives. Options are a wonderful investment mechanism and I think would be very good for bitcoin being accepted by a wider range of investors.

Yeah those public-key private keys are a big security problem.