You go through a payment processor like "OKPay". But they take a commission and enforce KYC. If you are bold, you do a wire transfer to the recipient. But then the receiver can never send you the BTC.
It's why the arbitration system is a critical component of `bitsquare`.

Coinfeine works differently. You can only use OKPay and you must have a small amount of BTC as deposit.

Honestly, I only replied to this thread because you were calling people who disagree with you ignorant. I wanted to tell you that other people can have reasons to not believe into bitsquare. Resorting to name calling doesn't change it.

> More options lowers spreads
Yes, if the market is efficient *and* if these options are equivalent. Localbitcoin is more expensive but the premium is acceptable because it targets people who deal in cash. I don't see where `bitsquare` wants to position themselves. Their video doesn't explain that. It focuses on being decentralized but never covers the advantages. For instance, Bitcoin is decentralized: A government cannot emit more bitcoins or take them away from you.

They could work on an app-purchase model or on a commission.

Don't get me wrong, it'd be great if they succeed.

Well - you know to a certain extend because it has to be lower than the target difficulty. Therefore it has at least a certain number of 00 in front. Beyond that, no ... no one can tell.

I haven't said anything about ethics. No idea where this comes from. I said that I comply with KYC because I don't want to be fined or end in jail.

The demo is useless as it is. You know it too. It's a token of good faith. It says: "We are working on it". Cool. But I want to know if it offers a better price than going to my local exchange. If not, I won't use it. Would you?

Yes and I feel the blockchain is not the right place to store my personal data. It's big enough as it is.

There are proposed extensions to the bitcoin protocol to address some of these questions. See this [OP_CHECKLOCKTIMEVERIFY][1] for example. It is available on viacoin. Eventually, the idea is that sidechains will be better suited for these scenarios leaving the blockchain with 'normal' transactions.

[1]: https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0065.mediawiki

Independently from what KYC is for, it will be strongly enforced. At the end of the day, I don't think a system whose goal is to circumvent it will work like I don't think saying that my body is mine and I should be allowed to use drugs is an acceptable reason.

But back to bitsquare, the funding scheme doesn't work for me. I'd be funding a stage of the project without knowing if the final product would be delivered.
It's better for me to pay for a product that exists. Give a demo or something. Instead, they have a YouTube video and a whitepaper that is more marketing than tech.

I'm not saying it's a scam - I actually believe they work hard on it. The mailing list has a lot of activity. But it seems a bit disorganized and optimistic thinking. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I prefer to pay when I use it. For instance, they could have an app-purchase kinda thing where the product would be free but an API would require a premium.

You seem to be nearly ideological when it comes to decentralized exchanges. Most of us don't share your views. I don't care about whether it's centralized or not. Furthermore, I believe a decentralized exchange will have even more scams. Coinfeine looks like a better choice at this moment.

KYC isn't something that banks want. On the contrary, they would love to deal with anyone and make profit. When they get caught, they have to pay massive [fines][1]. KYC is one of the most effective means to fight terrorism but let's not get into politics.

The bottom line is that the US government will not see it kindly. You could say that they say the same about copyright infringements but IMO, this is more serious. They already go after [`localbitcoins`][2]. They are isolated cases for sure. Still, I prefer to be safe than sorry.

> No, we need robust systems in place that can operate independent of those power structures, regardless of what crazy rules they try to come up with to protect their power base.

What structures are you talking about? Banks? Exchanges? Governments?

[1]: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/12/11/us-hsbc-probe-idUSBRE8BA05M20121211
[2]: http://www.coindesk.com/localbitcoins-users-criminal-charges-florida/

First of all, I've read their whitepaper and message board so I think I did my research. I'd like to have a global decentralized exchange too but unfortunately I don't think their approach will achieve this.
- The model is similar to `openbazaar`. It relies on arbitragers to mediate between parties in case of disagreement. For a trustless system, I think it's worse than an normal exchange.
- They say they want to by-pass the `KYC` requirement. To me, it's asking for trouble. Just because you are doing P2P doesn't mean you can circumvent the law.
- Technically speaking, they use a DHT (TomP2P). I doubt it will scale and will be fast enough for trading. Also, I don't see how they prevent spamming and malicious nodes flooding with fake orders
- They actually ask too little. They want 120 BTC and they are at 30 now. 120 is about 2 month-man and they need to do much more than that. Either look for a lot more or don't ask for anything. Asking for a bit makes it look unprofessional.

This thread reminds me of [Calvin & Hobbes](http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2012/11/07)

OK, I see where you come from. But you don't get infected just by installing software. Anyway, if you prefer Linux it's your choice. The latest major security vulnerabilities were not on Windows though.

Linux is no different than Windows and people should really stop thinking that there is something magical about it. You don't need to install software as root to infect your machine with malware. Obviously, if you do it the malware has full access to the machine but running a trojan with your own credentials is enough to steal your wallet data. Conversely, if you run with UAC you will have a secure prompt before being able to install software.

True, but blockchain.info is notorious for doing the calculation poorly, i.e. including double spends, orphaned blocks, ignoring address versions, etc.

Linux is *not* without [malware](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_malware). It hasn't been so as soon as it became popular.

No, but thanks

I asked a similar question a while [ago](https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=761283.msg8583616#msg8583616) and people seemed fine with the extra storage needed. With multi sig boxes, the premise of not losing data because you have your seed no longer holds. After all, other people must not lose their seed either. I guess that you are now also required to store the master pub keys of all parties involved which are simply more seeds.

I suspect it is just the way Armory or Bitcoin Core handles undoing transactions from orphan blocks (I coded something similar in my client).
First the transaction that sends you the coin is seen in the blockchain. It's added to your list of transactions and you see the first line. Later on, the block is orphaned and every transaction from it has to be undone. The app can do one of two things:
- It deletes the first line or
- It creates a second line that reverses the first one.

Both solutions have pros & cons, so it's legit to have either implementation. (I chose #1)
Since it's now in the blockchain, I think the scenario is

- you got credit
- it got reversed because it went to an orphaned block
- then the transaction was remined and you got credit again.

Or I could be completely wrong.

If all parties use HD wallets, you can use HDM. Then you don't have to remember the public keys that were used because you can regenerate them.

The functional approach helped keep the code short but there are still a few nasty aspects specially with a headers-first approach.
It works great though. I've tested synchronizing from/to bitcoin core and spv wallets and I now use it to monitor my Electrum/Armory/BIP32 wallets in one place.

If you are only interested in balances, you can scan the utxo set and that only takes a minute but I don't know if it's possible with bitcoin core.