Not enough Japanese are interested in Bitcoin (yet). Quasi-mainstream awareness in Japan started about a month ago with the Gigazine article. If there's a giant bubble starting now, it could grow into a full-on craze, but otherwise it may take a while. When Japan does enter, it will enter BIG.

Hehe, もし日本語で討論などしたかったらこのスレでしようか？

For more context, it's been fairly obvious that China is encouraging its citizens to buy gold. Bitcoin could just be an extension of that policy, backed by a certain contingent of the party. If so, we ain't seen NOTHING yet.

Hits on Chinese Bitcoin article on Wikipedia, past 90 days:

Either wrestling with the all-time high or wrestling with $300. This consolidation was necessary, and it in no way indicates the recent run-up is over. This market is as hot as it possibly can be without going bananas. Pressure has built, prepare for the second stage of the Chinese rocket.

Up.

The only reason it hasn't gone up for a week is it really couldn't: it was growing too fast and needed a break. That break is about to end, and then it seems strongly that we will rise. I'm guessing Tues/Wed we'll break out upward.

Yeah, it stops second-guessing, lets you go with your gut, keeps you from getting bogged down in the details and missing the forest for the trees. It's a corrective for over-analysis, so it only works if you're actually prone to over-analysis. (The right amount of alcohol. Too much is eventually worse, of course.)

For highly analytical people like me, we make some of the best decisions when drunk.

Yes, multiple parties controlling the same coins are an exception.

Keep in mind that what allows fractional reserve is lack of competition (a company could profitably differentiate itself from competitors by maintaining transparency), and what causes lack of competition is government regulation. In a completely unregulated market, fractional reserve is a non-issue because there is no possibility of monopolistic privilege for any one company or cartel.

In Bitcoin, there is no such thing as ownership besides control (which in Bitcoin is the same as possession).

I don't see what you're getting at. With Bitcoin, legal or moral ownership doesn't matter for control - it's the ultimate neutral money, transcending the laws and power and opinions of individuals or groups.

In the FBI's case, someone in the FBI knows the private key or the password for accessing it, and that person has complete control over those coins. Unless multiple people have access, in which case each of them do.

Bitcoin enables such unimpeachable control over your money that the distinction between ownership and control goes away.

Owning gold implies you have the moral and/or legal right to control your money.
Owning bitcoin means YOU CONTROL YOUR MONEY. Period.

It's so incredibly and obviously superior in hindsight that people will look back and laugh that Bitcoin took so long to be adopted.

Probably positive. Besides the fact that Bitcoin is still small enough that "all publicity is good publicity," it also adds to the perception that Bitcoin is "good money." Plus there must be countries or people who cannot send the money any other way and will be forced to learn Bitcoin in order to get their files back. If there's a virus in the future that requires payment only in Bitcoin, that will make it even stronger. I don't really feel like it'll affect Bitcoin perception negatively anyway, since it's clearly just people wanting bitcoins, which isn't Bitcoin's fault.

This few days of consolidation couldn't be more normal. Even if I had a crystal ball and knew for sure the price would go past the all-time high within the next two weeks, I still would expect a consolidation during these few days. Simply continuing up at the rate we were going would've been insane. So there's so far zero evidence the bull move of the past few weeks is over. Consolidation is exactly what we'd expect if the run-up is to continue. My guess is we're going up, probably within a week.

It might consolidate for weeks, but I think only a few days because I sense fierce momentum, especially from China. They're getting their first taste of the Bitcoin ride, and I bet they like it. Plus Second Market, Fortress, and all the media attention.

That's probably true, so we consolidate until some pressure builds up, then gush higher. Actually we've already consolidated long enough to go up again, but since everything in the market moves is embellished (up too high, crash too low, consolidate for too long), consolidation will probably also last a few more days.

Also I think focusing on the public ledger aspect, rather than the "bitcoins," is less likely to draw laughter. The Money is Memory thesis is very powerful. It sidesteps many typical objections.

I don't mind if people laugh. Bitcoin is a funny-sounding idea, after all. When I first heard about it, if I'd been in a different mindset at the time I might've laughed, too, but I knew I didn't understand it enough to decide it was ridiculous for sure, even though it sure sounded that way. Fortunately the person who mentioned it (I believe it was MoonShadow or Peter Surda, on another forum) was obviously intelligent so I pretty much knew it couldn't be as ridiculous as first impressions made it seem. If it was a misguided project, it had to be for a more subtle reason that these otherwise intelligent folks failed to catch - I noted to myself.

Still, I'm good at giving things the benefit of the doubt; most people just aren't that careful.

One thing I'm always sure to tell people first is, "When I first heard of Bitcoin it sounded totally ridiculous. I was ready to write it off completely but I had a few lingering questions. I looked into those and realized there could be something to it. Eventually something clicked and I saw that it deserved at least some research. A few days of intense research made me realize it was actually probably legit, for many counterintuitive reasons that require some understanding of both ecnomics and cryptography to fully appreciate. Eventually with further research all my questions were answered and I realized it was definitely legit and would probably change the world."

Even if Satoshi turned out to be this awesome person who would interview perfectly, all that has to happen is for him to be caught with something unmentionable (planted or real) or framed for some other unmentionable crime and then Bitcoin would be endlessly dragged through the mud. It'd be a terrible move for him personally and for Bitcoin in general.

Yeah, after a week or so of bouncing around $200 there will be more of a handle.

They can't manipulate the market very much with so few coins, and what little they could do would just enrich traders at the FBI's expense.

Even if the price goes up 100x by the time they sell the coins, and they sell for $2 billion, it will still be about the same effect on the market. They're probably eager to liquidate them ASAP lest they lose out on their millions, but even if the FBI people are Bitcoin bulls they still will only have a very small percentage of the market cap, whether they sell it for 20 million or 20 billion. Their stash cannot grow in value without the market growing by about the same degree. (The error is ceteris paribus assumptions, or "near-field thinking.")