You are still spouting nonsense in between your otherwise valid comments. The US dollar is not equivalent to debt. They are different things. A man with a bank account of $10,000 is NOT in an identical financial position to a man with a bank account of -$10,000. Your theory suggests that dollars=equal debt, and thus the two men are equivalent. That doesn't pass the straight-face test, let alone the more important test of reason. Dollars have value because you can exchange them for things. Will that be true in 10 years? Maybe not. But right now, they have value. They are not debt. They are assets of the bearer (but yes - depreciating assets).

Consider if the US was still on a gold standard, so that dollars were fixed to gold. The US Gov could STILL be trillions of dollars in debt, and we could still see the US Debt Clock in much the same manner. Your example is silly.

Thankfully, under a gold standard, a huge debt would encourage gold reserves to leave the country, thus curtailing the debt (this is why gov's don't like gold standards).

I can attest that Al Jazeera English is truly excellent. I had access to them while living in Dubai and I was amazed how much more in-depth and interesting their topics were than CNN/Fox/MSNBC/Etc. Now that I'm back in the states, the moment it's available in my area I'll sign up.

I expect we'll see more markers in Greece soon.

Well "in theory" the legitimate owner of that trademark could sue anyone who used the name/logo of bitcoin on their site (like a vendor who accepted bitcoin, etc.). They could also sue any site that offered bitcoin services.

But again, it's not a valid mark, because it was used in commerce long before the filing by people other than the applicant and this necessarily invalidates it. It's also very easy to prove that it was used earlier. But hey, can't fault the guy for trying to grab the name... I might have =)

Either him, or you.

Agreed. Pretty funny that it got through, though. The Government fails even at it's own crappy processes.

Your prophecy?  Of course miners are going to leave, the profit rate for mining will tend toward zero necessarily and as that happens all but the most efficient miners will turn off their rigs. It is not a "prophecy" but a certainty.

Let's see about your $11 prophecy for Friday... willing to make a bet? Or are your words empty?

The more apt question is, "I prefer BTC to X".  You don't really NEED it for anything yet, but the idea is that it's a better option than anything else out there for a variety of uses.

For me so far,
X= shopping online
X= sending money to friends

Extremely well-written post, OP. Thank you for your salient message.

Remember, many of the .com millionaires went on to fund stage 2 projects in the web world, and made MUCH MORE from those investments. Something to keep in mind

BINGO. That's the difference. A universal decimal shift moves everyone's account in a uniform manner. A central bank printing money increases only the central bank's account, at the expense of everyone else.

Even if the decimal shift wasn't moved, but we actually suddenly had 21 billion bitcoins instead of 21 million... so long as this is done uniformly so that every wallet reflects the new change, then functionally nothing at all has changed. In fact - this is exactly the same as moving the decimal

Good question, OP, I think many people have the same concern and it's crucial for people to know the distinction.

Yes I ignored the house part to keep things simple cause we were just looking at the dollar side.

However I do not think Bernanke is "herding everyone into housing" in order to slaughter them for his banker friends. I think he is making decisions based on flawed economic theory... he is a Keynesian, and is desperately trying to keep house prices from falling because, to him, "deflation" is the worst thing in the world. He's just a smart guy that learned all the wrong stuff, but of course those are exactly the types that end of in Washington, no? =)

Yes you're correct, but I am still "better off" after the sale. I have made say $300,000 in USD, but the USD money supply has been devalued in aggregate. The loss of wealth is shared by all holders of dollars, whereas the benefit of the newly printed money is me (and the bank). So I get $300,000 and perhaps that is now worth only $299,999.98 in real terms.

And yes of course dollars are a depreciating asset. They suck, and we ought to get rid of them entirely.

Tip: don't start your post with an insult. That was mean and unnecessary. If you're going to be insulting, you should at least be correct. You're not.


You are suggesting that a gold/silver monetary system is "more manipulable" than a fiat paper system? That is incorrect. To manipulate gold markets, you must own gold or control stakes in gold markets via options, etc. One can certainly manipulate gold markets but it would be immensely expensive to do so. Contrast this with manipulating fiat paper money markets... you must merely input zeros in your central bank computer system. It's free to do so. The US Gov't is perpetually manipulating the money system by printing dollars to purchase treasury debt (quantitative easing). The ECB is perpetually manipulating the Euro supply to buy the debt of failing member states. China is perpetually printing Yuan to help keep the currency devalued vs. the dollar to encourage exports. All these things happen constantly and yet you want to claim fiat paper money is harder to manipulate than gold and silver money?  Really?

The "billions of dollars of gold and silver" does not belong to the people, contrary to what they might tell you. It belongs to the US Gov't and/or the Federal Reserve System. The fact that you can't trade your dollars for gold and silver IS PRECISELY WHY it is correct to say they aren't backed by those metals. There is no backing of US Dollars by any commodity, period. Dollars used to be backed by gold... not anymore. Dollars are fiat... printed at whim and for the express benefit of the Federal Government and the Federal Reserve System.



On this point, you are correct.

Sorry bud. I'm as anti-fed and anti-dollar as anyone on these forums, but I think you are confused.

When I hold $20, I hold $20. So long as it has purchasing power, it's an asset, not a debt. When I have $20, I do not OWE $20... you are speaking nonsense. The fact that someone before me borrowed $20, then gave it to me, does not pass along the debt obligation to me.

A $20 Federal Reserve Note IS money... it is just crappy fiat money and we ought to rid ourselves of it.

There are thousands of people spending btc. I've purchased six or seven things myself (none related to mining). It is still a very very small economy, of course, but to say "what a load of crap" is pretty silly. It can be thought of as a small town - very few services, and many things are inconvenient. But, this town is growing month on month at an incredible clip. Dismiss it at your peril.

 If you can't make sales, maybe you're just not offering the goods/services which the market desires at your offered price?  What exactly are you selling? Maybe I'll buy?

Don't be a douche. Or, if you want to be a douche, at least satirize his idea accurately. 

Your suggestion of smaller miners getting out of the biz will happen naturally as profitability decreases, no need to worry about that.

You seem to be further suggesting a VC group.... but why such would be tied to miners is confusing. Miners will tend to focus on being efficient miners. Investors will tend to focus on being profitable investors. There is no necessary link between the two, just like OPEC is not an investment group.

I think you're mixing initiatives that have no reason to be mixed =) But I like your spirit!

It is not hard to imagine that in 20 years or whatever when all the btc has been created, IF bitcoin is successful the number of transactions per second will be many. A block created at 10 min intervals will include literally tens of thousands of transactions, most or all will have a very small fee attached. At such a point, this fee would be much larger than the 50 btc currently generated from successful block discovery.

The fee itself will dwarf the new btc incentive long before this ever becomes an issue.

Damien FTW

Tip: don't start your comments with an insult. I'll address your points:

1) A decentralized exchange is a great idea, but doesn't need to be built into the actual client. That would in fact complicate and weaken the core of bitcoin. Exchanges and other services are properly built around the core of Bitcoin, not as part of the core because their existence isn't necessary for Bitcoin operations at the most basic level. To use an exaggerated example, it would be silly to build in a fancy graphical charting software into the core client, even though such a thing would be useful. Keep the client small, clean, and pure. The rest can be built beyond it.

2) An easier interface would be great, and of course it's probably being planned as we speak. But the current interface is not a flaw with Bitcoin as a protocol per se, it's just an aesthetic issue (and the client is still in beta, remember).

3) Buying/selling functionality inside the client? Again, see point 1. This of course doesn't preclude an alternative client from being release which offers this benefit - but that's not a competitor to bitcoin as a protocol.

4) Regarding your "motivation to spend currency," that is a philosophical/economic difference that you and myself have. I believe it is economically foolish and misguided to "encourage" spending for spending's sake because it interferes with pricing signals. If a new bitcoin competitor came along that had a mechanism to encourage spending (like "decay!!!"), I'd stay the hell away from it but you're welcome to abandon Bitcoin for that if you wish.  You share your view with Obama, Keynes, Geithner, and Krugman. I share my view with Rothbard, Mises, and Hayak.

Only your last point is relevant to the Bitcoin protocol itself, and that's a philosophical difference. If you have other, better, reasons why a competitor would destroy Bitcoin, please present them.