But this isn't for the general public - it's for the users of one website. And there are plenty of sites that already use Satoshi exclusively. The OP has no power to abolish BTC/"bitcoin", and I'm quite certain has no desire either.

It fell in 2010, 2012 and 2013, but it's been steadily increasing outside those (fiscal) years (and is projected to continue increasing this year and next). It was $16797.5 billion in 2013, having risen from $11512.2 bn in 2003, $6878.7 bn in 1993, etc.

Depending how you measure it (and which economist you listen to!), US public spending is between 30 and 45% of GDP. This isn't an extreme: there are developed countries that are better, and worse.

I'm not sure I understand why cutting/delaying entitlement benefits doesn't constitute a reduction in public spending?

Or they could reduce public spending. Britain in the early 1980s did this, and the Public Sector Borrowing Requirement became (temporarily) the Public Sector Debt Repayment.

You're quite right - been a while since I used Microwallet. CoinBox.me also uses BTC - I guess when I used them both I mentally converted to Satoshis (which is only OK as long as they use a fixed number of decimal places). I guess then I'd still say Satoshi on the grounds that your users should be able to convert in their head once they reach Microwallet. And that excellent tool-tip suggestion from another user? Maybe use - or at least include - the BTC value so your users see what they'll see once they reach Microwallet.

Sensible minimising barriers - but there's no reason why they'd need to sign up in order to pick a system! Their choice could persist beyond the initial session by cookies, for example. (To be honest I assumed you'd want them getting to "their currency" as quickly as possible, and even in a classic eCommerce system signing in is usually seen as being a near-final step).


Well, if you really are stuck with one system (and I don't think you are) then you should probably go with the  system Microwallet.org uses (Satoshis, IIRC?) - the principle of least surprise.

Your customers will have a far better idea than me or you. I'd suggest providing a mechanism for them to choose what they're comfortable with - just like eCommerce sites offering users a choice of currency - and use a sensible default (either BTC or - probably better for small amounts - Satoshi).

I treat an inability to prune is an invitation to ignore. It also has the happy side-effect of catching posters I've already ignored, but that people still insist on quoting-as-they-quote-other-quoters-quoting.

A word other posters are confusing with "intervened"

"Intertwined" is connected together (possibly loosely) - think of several lengths of twine (string, thin cord, yarn, etc) jumbled up, and then pulling on the end of one piece - it'll make the other pieces of twine move too. It's quite a good analogy for the loose coupling between exchanges, IMO.

Probably lots of reasons not to associate Bitcoin with Che Guevara, but anti-statism isn't a good one. Marxism's eventual goal is Communism, which its proponents see as a classless, stateless society.

Breaching copyright is illegal in some jurisdictions; it's a civil matter in most. If BitPay believe that bitmarket.lt have breached BitPay's copyright then - I'd suggest - it's BitPay who should take action. However, it's entirely possible that BitPay don't regard this as a breach of copyright and welcome the competition.

Incidentally, a quick Google-images search for "pay with bitcoin" returns several instances of the Bitcoin logo beside a blue "Pay with Bitcoin" bar, and QR codes are nearly ubiquitous with Bitcoin - my phone's wallet (Mycellium) uses them, I've even had one as my avatar on Bitcointalk since 2011.

I don't have any problem with bitmarket.lt charging higher fees than Bitpay - their costs will be different, subject to regional and local variations, etc. Lithuania has its own currency (it won't adopt the Euro until next year at the earliest), for example.

There definitely are examples of very dubious copying scams out there (attempts to grab private keys or passwords), but I'm not seeing anything here to suggest that this is anything other than a new service using very common design elements.

It is - and at least one other exchange has already done this: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=754279.0. This article suggests "most if not all of the Digital currency exchanges based in China" will be - or have been - audited.

Not really, no. Phil Zimmerman was investigated by the US Customs Service for (allegedly) breaching munitions export regulations (you'll recall that that was because PGP was being "exported" (i.e. downloaded by people outside the US). Peter Gutmann has written about his career "smuggling munitions" (crypto stuff, again), etc. Cryptography pits "these people" against powerful (state) actors who have demonstrated their willingness to arrest, investigate and harass. I find it odd that they found the strength to keep going and maintain any kind of public profile!

Not really, at least not from the article you cited: according to an academic who's cited by a World Bank economist in one report there are such things as "naturally occurring ponzi schemes". I'm not sure I'd take Shiller's view of "financial bubbles that form without the manipulator’s baton but from finished natural market forces and with one person’s expectations feeding into another’s" and extrapolate from that that Basu's employer considers Bitcoin to be a naturally occurring ponzi. Heck, I'm not sure I'd even extrapolate as far as saying that the World Bank agree with Shiller (about financial bubbles) - I'd want to research that further before making that claim.

Awesome! You could maybe ask whitslack for pointers on generating the chart.

Indeed! And some of that debt remains: it's a small part - now - of the total national debt, but the UK still has Napoleonic War debts, in the form of undated gilts. I believe the UK continued to issue undated gilts - perpetual debt - right up to the First World War. (Almost) within living memory.

I'm fairly certain they do charge fees - just not for trades (or deposits). My Chinese is non-existent, but running Google Translate on OKCoin's China homepage you can see they mention trades and deposits (no fee), but not withdrawals. This site says (withdrawal) fees start at 0.1%.

OK, these people you've spoken to - why do they need BTC?

If they need to purchase something that's priced in BTC - surely they understand that they need to buy the BTC to cover the purchase price? And if the purchase price is less than 1 BTC, surely they understand that, and realise that to make the purchase they need to overcome their fear of <1 and obtain less than 1 BTC?

Alternative possibility: they don't need to buy anything. You're trying to persuade them to "invest" in Bitcoin - is that correct? And they're wary of "investing" in <1 BTC. If this is the case - why are you trying to get them to "invest"? They don't understand investing (if they did they'd understand that many investments can involve <1 - land (0.5 acres), gold (I know very few people who own a whole gold bar, a whole kilo...), etc, they don't understand Bitcoin, and "investing" in something they don't understand is never a good idea.

So... why do these people need BTC? Every time someone raises the "people won't buy it unless they can buy a whole BTC" I'm left with questions but never practical answers.

And yes, I've talked to a wide range of people about it. The people who think that they need a whole BTC in oder to be "investors" are not people I consider useful for increasing adoption at this point. (People buying BTC to transact, well, that's more useful). Real estate seems to manage quite well, despite <1 acre / hectare /whatever being common for anyone who's not a farmer etc; when people need to purchase land they - hopefully - make the effort to understand the market. It's the same with Bitcoin - adoption will be driven by real need, not by persuading unsavvy investors to "invest" in something they don't understand yet.

Meh. BTC has fallen further in one day before now. 12 June 2014, 10 April, 27 March, 18 December 2013 (opened at 675USD, closed at 520 ZOMG!!!1!), 16 December... Hyperbole, much?

Quoted for relevancy.

None of this happens in a vacuum. Stores aren't a perpetual motion machine, driving the BTC price down every time we purchase from them. In order for them to have BTC to depress the price of BTC there need to be prospective purchasers purchasing BTC and driving up the price.

I doubt there'll be 100% efficiency - some purchasers will have a stash of BTC and won't bother buying more simply because they want to buy something, and some merchants will keep some or all of their BTC. But for the moment at least most purchasers will buy BTC around the time they make a purchase, and most merchants will sell BTC around the time they make a sale.