Of all the many, many proposals (all of which seem to me to be solutions in search of a problem) "Zib" is the only one I've seen where there's been a real effort to provide the tools and information to make the change - most times the issue is presented as either "all we need to do is... [non trivial thing]" (social problem) or "all the developers need to do is... [non trivial thing]" (technical problem).

Incidentally, the names you say are variants of "microbitcoin" - strictly they're variants of BTC itself, the same way gigabyte is a variant of byte, millilitre is of litre, microgram of gram, etc. Well, the familiar ones are - "crobits" and "eubits" are new to me, and I can't determine scale from the names (which, incidentally, is one thing I do dislike about "Zib" - it uses a new name to replace familiar names).

Now, that is interesting - thanks! LTC volume is far, far higher than I'd have expected. I'm not convinced the chart tells us more than that, however - if it was possible to drill down geographically, or by exchange... For now, though, I think grokking the LTC volume is going to be challenging enough for me... Thanks again!

Sure. That's the nature of software development. There are currently 375 open issues logged at Github: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/issues. But the OP was looking for problems which couldn't be overcome - and a bug that bad is pretty hard for me to imagine after Heartbleed, and the speed with which it was addressed by most developers and sys admins.

OK... http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/btcnCNY#rg180ztgSzm1g10zm2g25zv - that's BTC China's 6-month chart, with volume bars. What am I looking for? (I'm seeing high volume around the December/January peak, and low - but fairly consistent - volume from late January onwards. Initial thoughts are that that's what I'd expect to see on any exchange - what am I missing?)

I'm in the same unhip, behind-the-times boat as Siegfried - your theory is a new one for me. Up 'til now I think most people were working on the assumption that the Chinese exchanges have been losing volume because the People's Bank of China has made it nigh on impossible for people to get money in and out of exchanges.

I think it depends on the channel and the programme - the BBC is major; Click Online - not so much. It's more "popular science" than the equivalent programmes on other UK channels ("win all these sponsored goodies!") but it's still pretty low-brow and unloved/unwatched, the kind of programme the BBC makes in order to justify receiving TV license fee cash...

I'm pretty sceptical about media attention anyway - but I have fairly unorthodox views on Bitcoin and mass adoption (I don't think my grandmother being able to buy her groceries with BTC is a compelling use-case for Bitcoin).

The BBC's consumer tech programme, Click (formerly Click Online) apparently featured Bitcoin in an episode last year (I didn't see it, but this thread made me think of Click Online for the first time since I cancelled my TV license and stopped watching TV!): http://www.ovguide.com/tv_episode/click-season-2013-episode-23-08062013-4583511

Edit: here's the BBC iPlayer link (not sure if it'll work outside the UK ): http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b02xdtd4/Click_08_06_2013/

(Kind of) Playing Devil's Advocate here, but - what kind of bugs in the code would cause a problem that couldn't be overcome? Particularly post-Heartbleed I'm very impressed with the online world's resilience. Bugs in, say, Bitcoin-QT would only affect people using it - people with their BTC in an offline wallet wouldn't be directly affected (though they might be affected by a fall in price resulting from the bad publicity).

No worries! I can still remember when MtGox was the exchange - and it was based in the US (and only handled Dollars ). It's a fast moving game, this Bitcoin malarky!

To be fair, when I read "Major China exchange FXBTC Closing down" I immediately assumed Huobi or OKCoin were closing (which would be major news). It's good you've amended the thread's title.

Well, people are already using "Satoshi" (when I - guilty secret time! - trawl the faucets, it's "Satoshi" that's used by the faucets and - presumably - by the "fauceteers").

Which brings me to... I have no idea - none of us have much of an idea - how other people are using Bitcoin. It seems to me bizarre to assume that how I use Bitcoin is necessarily equivalent to how other people use it. I trawl the faucets, and "Satoshi" is a useful concept. I buy BTC, and BTC is a useful concept. I make purchases with BTC, and mBTC is a useful concept. I imagine there are wealthy BTC-holders who would find mBTC, µBTC and Satoshis irrelevant. Likewise, for someone who only ever works with Satoshis any xBTC is largely irrelevant.

How merchants, exchanges etc price BTC is entirely up to them. They know their user-base far better than us. If an exchange, say, believes that some users have psychological barriers in buying "less" than a whole BTC then that exchange can - already - choose to price BTC in mBTC or µBTC (or even Satoshis - as the faucets already choose to do). But other exchanges should have the freedom to make their own decisions, decisions that reflect the needs of their own user-bases.

Right now there's a belief that mBTC is preferable to BTC. But we have no idea what price (strictly speaking, prices) BTC will be at in a few years. It could well be that the psychological barriers people currently believe exist will change or reform (we could well be arguing that mBTC is a barrier because - at USD450 per mBTC - people are deterred from purchasing part of a mBTC. Or we might find that - with 1 mBTC at USD0.01 it's all too confusing...)

tl;dr - we already have a wealth of options. Why would I want to limit someone else's options?

PS.  spazzdla, MegaHustlr - apologies for hijacking your discussion! I saw the word "Satoshi" and jumped too quick

I'm fairly sure MtGox used unique addresses for deposits, back when it was still based in the US. I don't know if more recent exchanges (relatively speaking...) behaved differently, though.

Well yes, and in later phases too (I envisage using BTC to buy PMs in the future, for example). The point is that using BTC as mere currency, and encouraging others to think of BTC as something they can buy groceries/coffee/beer with, doesn't really help Bitcoin. (And, taking this further, could potentially be detrimental - if someone buys 1BTC on our recommendation, spends it successfully, is generally happy with Bitcoin... but then watches as the BTC price rises... their initial positive impression is probably going to be replaced with a "WTF did I do? If only I'd kept that 1BTC and spent fiat instead What a rip-off!" (unless they took your advice and replaced the BTC they spent - but that's hardly convenient compared to fiat. I'm still going to use fiat for coffee!)

 

I can walk into my local café/bistro today and spend BTC instead of fiat... but - I'm not going to. It's a silly idea. The fiat I have in my pocket is losing its value constantly - in a month's time it'll buy me less coffee than it buys me now - so it makes sense to spend fiat, not BTC. (BTC is deflationary - in the long term I expect BTC to be worth much more than that coffee I could have bought with it).

Bitcoin does need to grow, the number of users does need to increase. But this "mass adoption" windmill is something we should stop tilting at. Bitcoin has far better potential than "something we can buy coffee/beer/groceries with".

I discovered Bitcoin shortly after returning from working abroad. I'd been paying a mortgage in one country while working in another. The forex costs were a killer (and I needed to plan ahead, since transfers between the two countries took a few days, and were a bit hit or miss in terms of time). This is Bitcoin's advantage for me - not a new way to buy stuff at Walmart.  That isn't to say this is the only use for Bitcoin, just that aping fiat is not a good use, and "mass adoption" (if it means granny can use BTC to buy her shopping) isn't a goal we should be seriously considering. (It is, however, one of those "truthy" goals, one that seems obvious and right - even if it's anything but).
 
(Disclaimer: I probably will use BTC in my local café at some point. But I'll do it to encourage a forward-looking business, not because it makes sense for me personally).

It's Easter Monday for many people - large chunks of Europe, and China too, I believe. The Huobi daily chart shows a marked decrease in volume from Friday through to now, I've been assuming that that's Chinese Christians celebrating rather than trading.

The 40-45% reduction was in the past, surely? Regardless, if you look at a graph and see what's being tracked has been very volatile you would - presumably - conclude that there's a high probability that it will continue to be volatile.

It kind of is. Look at the long-term graph (http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/bitstampUSD#tgSza1gWMAzm1g20za2gWMAzm2g1920zl) - BTC typically falls by 50-75% after every all time high (and in a matter of days, not weeks). This has been occurring every 8-9 months. BTC's volatility is well known.

A resemblance to this? http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/bitstampUSD#tgSza1gWMAzm1g20za2gWMAzm2g1920zl

rpietila is compiling historic price data here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=322058.0

For actual exchange data the best bet is probably MtGox on Bitcoincharts (with the very obvious caveat that the data stops abruptly!): http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#tgSza1gSMAzm1g20zm2g25zl

In the UK at least debit cards can (and do) allow connected accounts to go overdrawn. There are two main ways people make "cardholder present" payments with debit cards in the UK: for payments over £10-£20 it's "chip and PIN" (push debit card into reader, enter PIN), and for payments under £20 there's NFC (hold card near reader). The second method doesn't connect to the bank at all; the first method only asks your bank whether the bank believes there are sufficient funds (but transfers don't confirm immediately, so there's a chance that you don't actually have sufficient funds if you've made purchases on your debit card in the past few days).

I've also used "EFTPOS" in Australasia - as far as I know that was immediate, however.