Offline cold storage wallet is going to be the only thing that is totally safe.

Depending on the amount you are talking, its probably fine to store in an wallet like Electrum etc.
Be sure to find a wallet that lets you keep permission of her private key.

Least secure is the exchanges.
You can enable 2FA so ono one can get in without using an app on their cell phone,
but you don't control your private keys, and if someone finds a security hole in the site they may rob the entire exchange.
And there is no FDIC insurance to replace your money if it gets stolen.

User OgNasty posted this picture in another topic.

I think we need to be very careful because we are on the edge right now.
The United States is the guy in a rich neighborhood who lost his job but lies to his wife and pretends to go to work every day.
We are just trying to keep up appearances but the checkbook is empty kids.
It's only a matter of time before the whole thing crashes down and the repo men come to take all the furniture.

I wanted to get peoples opinions on mechanical keyboards-
what switch do you prefer? do you like different switches for typing and gaming?
what keyboard brand do you prefer?
do you get custom key caps/ etc? (Really customizing your keyboard.)

I prefer cherry blue for typing and was using cherry brown for gaming.
Recently I picked up a Rosewill board on sale that has Kailh blue switches.
I like them so far and the board was definitely worth $50- fully backlit every key.
Hopefully it lasts as long as my last keyboard- a couple years.

If you've never used a mechanical keyboard, do yourself a favor and at least try it.
Anyone who spends a lot of time with computers will tell you- it's definitely worth the money.

I think the last week or two is proof that ETH has a pretty solid foothold right now.

Having an extended DDOS attack which resulted in (yet another) fork,
and the release of a competitor (Zcash) causing total chaos for the markets,
I was actually surprised the price of Ethereum didn't lose more.


News like this could also be a positive sign that the sky isn't falling for Vitalik Buterin and friends.
http://www.coindesk.com/microsoft-launching-new-ethereum-blockchain-product/
Article about Microsoft using Ethereum in some projects.

I agree.
Factom seems like it has the potential for being a good long-term investment,
but it's definitely going to lose some value with the delay of M2 and the lack of good news recently.

Everything about alt-coins right now is how good your marketing department is.
Hopefully FCT is not one of the trash coins that is about to create the largest alt-coin bubble of all time.

2017 is going to be very interesting for Bitcoin.
Government agencies in China and the US are starting to look at possibly regulating exchanges and Bitcoin transactions.
This may lead to new laws passed governing these sites which could be a good thing to prevent users from being scammed,
but could create new taxes and fees on earnings.

I'm not sure what this all means but big changes could be coming.

In the future this could possibly be true.
For now, however, most people still need to change fiat to BTC or BTC to fiat at some point.
Until we have more places that accept Bitcoin you will still have to do a conversion.
Maybe in some places you could live entirely off Bitcoin, but for 99% of people you still need some form of fiat paper currency or a credit card.

I'm not sure we will see a new ATH,
but the price of Bitcoin definitely seems to be on the rise.
I don't think that $800 by the end of the year/ start of 2017 is out of the question.

Your choice to sell or hold would be based on your initial purchase price and your need for money.
If you could do without the cash I think holding for at least a few more weeks would be wise.
The price may go flat for a bit but I really don't think we will see below $700 any time soon.

It all depends if anyone actually starts accepting Zcash as a payment option.
If no one can pay for goods/ services with ZEC it will drop in value by a lot.
If some company like Coinbase picks it up and people can exchange fiat back and forth, there is no telling what the price could be.

I will say that anyone who uses Zcash for something like a darknet market is completely out of their mind.
There is no way that I would trust payments to be anonymous with this coin.

Unfortunately, most people that are interested in Bitcoin are doing things based on personal profit.
Hopefully it can be used as a tool for change, because as you pointed out, it makes so many things easy that were not possible before.
As time goes on, I would not be surprised to see charities and other social causes become involved with crypto-currencies.

I wouldn't be surprised if took another year or two for the full GUI to be released.

  There is nothing wrong with having someone help you manage your money. (As long as you know you can trust them.)

I was awful at managing my money, so I talked with my father and he helped me create a budget.
(Managing my direct deposits from work)

I also talked with my boss and he showed me the spreadsheets he uses to plan monthly bills.

I don't think its a bubble, since it seems to be consistently growing at a natural rate.

If there was a sudden 20-30% spike I believe we could easily lose that value,
but this feels like a slow and steady move to the $800 area.

If you have to maintain an online shop, box up and ship things to customers,
that's basically your job.

I would say a passive income (like others pointed out) is money you make off your previous investments without spending your time.

Investors in Bitcoin (and most all other altcoins) are hoping for an increase in price.
Trading is one of the things that make BTC popular.

There is something to be said for a currency that stays at a consistent value- it can be a safe investment during uncertain times.

Dogecoin and Litecoin didn't move in price much during the Zcash release.
I know some investors already believe these to be strong havens during volatile markets,
and I would not be shocked if that became their main purpose.

Thanks for the link. I've been reading over their website  but I still have some pages and technical documentation to read.

"Delegated harvesting" is very interesting.
It seems like a very good security feature to isolate your addresses, but couldn't you do the same thing with Bitcoin just by using one address for mining and another for cold storage?
(Or am I not understanding its purpose and possible uses in the future?)

I read this on the website but still don't fully understand-

What is this "POI"?
POI is short for "Proof-of-Importance". It is a consensus algorithm at the core of the NEM software. The higher your importance, the higher your chance to be allowed to calculate a block (and harvest the fees inside that block). POI adjusts your importance depending on how many transactions you make, with whom you make them and a number of other factors. If you don't do any transactions POI will set your importance based on your balance only (it is then similar to proof-of-stake).

I also need to read more about "delegated harvesting".
It sounds like the ability to mine offline but I'm not totally sure.

Its an example of (apparently) brilliant marketing and how mob mentality works.
99% of the people buying/ trading, mining have no idea about any of the technical aspects,
they only care about the hot new coin and a chance to make a few dollars.

It's kind of a sad comment on the state of the market actually,
but I guess that's human nature. (The desire to make money at whatever cost.)

Unfortunately, its not an entirely wrong train of thought.
Who needs to buy things anonymously? People buying drugs or weapons on the darknet.
Most average people will just pay for things with a credit card.
Until you give people the ease of use that a nice GUI, the ability to change fiat back and forth to a currency, and things like this,
you have to think- what are the reasons people will use this currency?
For now Monero, and even Bitcoin, haven't given us much reason to adopt them other than to invest, sit on your coins, and hope they accumulate value.

I like XEM its a very interesting project.
I wonder though if the "harvesting" of coins as opposed to traditional mining will be confusing and put people off the coin.
People are resistant to change and generally don't like things they don't understand.

Can anyone who knows a lot about the project explain the advantages of the way coins are generated?