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[turtlehurricane]

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[Zarathustra]

It is very clear that any commodity can be manipulated with paper. We as a community need to be very careful not to let this happen to Bitcoin, since it is apparently not illegal (yet).

Yes. It's a free market. Do you want to ban future contracts/markets? Future contracts are as old as the market (mesopotamia).

[findftp]

It is very clear that any commodity can be manipulated with paper. We as a community need to be very careful not to let this happen to Bitcoin, since it is apparently not illegal (yet).

Yes. It's a free market. Do you want to ban future contracts/markets? Future contracts are as old as the market (mesopotamia).

I want there to be a very strict law ...

Fuck your law, statist.
Free market will decide, not your laws.
Besides, exchanges already running fractional reserve, live with it and if you don't like it (like me) don't give them your coins.

Mt. Gox users learnt it the hard way.

[RustyNomad]

Don't worry about a law, just make sure you hold the 'real' thing.

That is why its said that one of the most important things about owning precious metals is the fact that you need to take ownership of it. Buy it and have it delivered to you where you are and or in another vault where you know its secure.

Not taking ownership of your precious metals it is almost the same as using a bitcoin wallet at an exchange where you do not have the private keys. The exchange can close down at any time and you are left no way to get your coins out so you are left with nothing.

[findftp]

Don't worry about a law, just make sure you hold the 'real' thing.
Not taking ownership of your precious metals it is almost the same as using a bitcoin wallet at an exchange where you do not have the private keys. The exchange can close down at any time and you are left no way to get your coins out so you are left with nothing.

To sum it up: Then you're goxed.

[findftp]

Fuck your law, statist.

I'm certainly not a statist, quite the opposite.

So tell me, who is going to enforce this law?

[BADecker]

Physical bitcoins would be great if there were a way to place Bitcoin digital info into each coin that could be used to authenticate the coin in conjunction with the blockchain. Could this be done with a chip implanted in each coin in such a way that it could not be removed without destroying the coin?

[Denker]

I understand turtlehurricane's point of view. This is really scary of course. But as findftp also wrote who is going to enforce the needed laws for us? The ones who make these laws are not on our site. The law makers are rather going with the banks. So yes this could be real threat and manipulation and nothing compared with gold would change. Same old trick with same effect.

[RustyNomad]

You guys know what the true irony of this whole thing is?

If I do this kind of thing in 'the real world' it will be considered fraud and I will land up with my backside thrown in jail. But hey, its the financial markets, there anything goes as long as there is a profit to be made.

[kelsey]

Don't worry about a law, just make sure you hold the 'real' thing.

people holding real gold should be worried though (well pissed off) as they are getting ripped off as 'paper gold' is diluting the real gold market.

[gentlemand]

Paper gold is more understandable than paper BTC and way easier to implement. There really aren't very many people interested in waiting a few days or weeks for their phantom gold to arrive and then store it.

People will be far less tolerant of this with BTC because they can have the real deal safely stored in their own hands in a few minutes.

[RGBKey]

This is why people need to own the private keys to their bitcoin and not trust any third party with any amount of money for a non-trivial amount of time.

[findftp]

And this is why money should have a high level of utility so that it is moving from one hand to another instead of held like a pet rock (gold).
Bitcoin is such money because it got an insane level of potential utility.