How possible is it to have each account holder's coins associated with a single, separate address/key? (I'm sure it'll be a PITA, but is it technically feasible?) This way, once someone opens an account, you can mail (encrypted file attachment, or mailed on paper) then the private key associated with their account, with instructions to make copies and back it up. Should anything happen to the system (crash, hack, government raid, zombie attack, whatever), users will still be able to manually import their private keys and get their coins off the block chain. Your businesses will still be able to continue operating and providing the same services they do now (easily-accessible secure banking, exchange, whatever).
Likewise, this will shift some of the liability onto the users, in case you are worried about insurance or legal issues.

Are you seriously, on a forum about a private anarcho-libertarian currency, full of free-market loving libertarians, saying that "a private organization is not a great thing???"


Isn't the whole point of capitalism to "take advantage of things?" Currencies, and especially USD and EUR, are in trouble, and Bitcoin stepped in to take advantage of things. Or are you against the idea of "profiting from disaster?"


As for Matthew, and, I can't believe I am saying this, but maybe you should take a lesson from MagicalTux of MtGox: When people accuse you and troll you, just ignore them, keeping your answers as professional as possible, and only to few succinct explanations on how things are going (with an occasional jab at the troll, maybe, but OCCASIONAL!)
Though I do admit, feeding trolls can be fun and addictive 

Trolls WAY trollier than you have predicted price drops with specific numbers before ($10 when it was at $15), only to be ridiculed when the price rebounded without coming close to their predictions. Be careful making specific price predictions.

Can you give me some ideas as to how someone who has access to my name, phone number, and e-mail (everyone I deal with practically) can scam me? This is very serious and worrying news, and I would want to be prepared to defend myself against scamers who have that info.

It may help to turn your feelings of pain into anger, and direct that into action to make sure that this issue is fixed and/or will never happen again. Good luck!

I would say the biggest cause is uncertainty. Businesses hate uncertainty more than they hate regulation, and with the constant political b*tching going on with threatened gov. shutdowns, debt ceilings, and whatever else is coming this Fall, I'd blame the current economic state of affairs directly on the House/Senate, rather than anything that's already been passed into law.

Because the OP asked?

This guy apparently lives about 1.5 hour's drive from me. If it turns out to be a ponzi scheme, I'll happily drive over and punch someone in the nose (for a fee)

Also, I wonder why Bitcoin services don't use a single address? Have customer deposits sent to a unique address to identify them, then immediately forward their money to a single central address that uses one key backed up in multiple locations. No need for continuous backups other that the database of user accounts and holdings.

It's not that there are no jobs, it's that there are more advanced jobs and fewer blue collar jobs. Unemployment rate for those with college education is actually pretty low, at 4.5% (personally, I don't know anyone of my friends in MD who lost a job, and know of two who quit theirs to find better ones)

http://www4.icmarc.org/for-individuals/market-view/chart-of-the-week/cotw-20110617usunemploymentbyeducationallevel.html

Even during the Great Depression, despite a HUGE unemployment rate, businesses were scrambling to find good employees and having trouble finding any. Machines replacing jobs just leaves more people with a lot more time to do more advanced and more creative things that require more brains and less muscle. So, machines replaced your cashier/assembly/low-skill job? Get some special job training or a degree.

Just a thought. Someone's site getting compromised means the hacker can also likely force the backup system to overwrite the backed p wallet with a blank/corrupt one. Would it be better to have the site operator "backup" an encrypted wallet to a specified directory, and the external backup service to the grabbing of the file off that server themselves? Keeping it one-way from the backup side will prevent any hacker access to the backups if the whole system is compromised.

Must've been a burly, hairy twelve year old...

Insurance fees will depend on the number of companies you are insuring, and the risk that those companies pose. Basically, if you have 10 companies, each insuring for $10,000 ($100,000 total), and there is a 10% chance that every year one of them will fail and file a claim (for $10,000), you need to make sure each company pays at least $10,000/10=$1,000 a year.
Your major hurdles will be
1) Getting enough people paying enough into a pool large enough to get it at least started, since insuring even just two companies means that you may need both of them to pay half of what they may be worth. If their risk is small, that may make things easier a bit.
2) Calculating the risk of each company will require some professional accounting help. They're called actuaries, there are typically 3 to 6 of those graduating from about 100 general accountants a year, so they're rare, and they are VERY expensive.
3) You will need someone doing on-site inspection of every business you are insuring to come up with initial rates, to make sure they are staying compliant, and to inspect them once they file a claim.
In short, it's not a cheap service to get off the ground. Though if you think there is a need for it, it may be something people are willing to invest in to get the initial insurance pool (of money) going.

As for how to insure Bitcoin, just issue policies in other currencies (USD/EUR), and when the business loses Bitcoin, they'll use their insurance to buy more. They would only be covered for a set amount of USD, so it will be up to the business to make sure they increase their coverage if they get more customers or the value of BTC goes up. Insurance companies aren't liable if the business can't cover all their losses because their coverage was small (ditto for you people with too little coverage on your houses or cars; if your house burns down or you hit a Ferrari, and your policy doesn't cover your losses, you're SOL).
I suspect there are already other insurance companies that insure sensitive valuable data. They may have trouble understanding what Bitcoin is for their "insurance audit" purposes (from #3 above), but they will likely come around.

I admit, I do not, but I would suspect it is a lot easier to sell something under the table than to hire and pay someone under the table. Despite what all the "illegal alienz!!!" reports are saying.
Reading further about this tax, I'm actually neutral about it. I don't understand it enough to know how much it will affect me should it be implemented, and don't think the effect will be significant.

Why not just get plain business liability insurance, and up your coverage as you increase deposits? It will cost you, and you will likely have to submit to security and business audits by the insurance company, but otherwise should be sufficient. If you lose people's money, just use insurance to buy more.
Though, you mentioned your bank will be free? So getting money for business insurance premiums (not cheap) will be tough...

You mean QR Codes???




Um, a 23% sales tax creates a HUGE incentive to avoid sales taxes. This will likely lead to black market trade skyrocketing. May end up costing more in regulation and policing as a result, if the government has any hopes of enforcing it (and you KNOW they'd want to enforce it)

Price goes up, "Not buying! Early adopters got all benefit!"
Price goes down, "Not buying! I'm worried price will keep falling!"

seems like we're still in early adopter stage. Not surprised price is so low, considering all the issues in the last two months.

I miss the good ol' days of 5am to 11pm back breaking farm work. EVERYONE was employed back then, from the day they turned 10, till they died at 35{.}

Damn furries...

Stupidly done backups still fail stupidly. And even good backups can get screwed. We use this system for our website, where important parts are available and distributed to site supporters. When something like a hard drive crash happens (we lost a chunk of our backup once), we put out a request and had people with their own backup copies send us the lost files back.