Don't hate me too much, but I think litecoin is superior to bitcoin

[bitcoiners]

So assuming LTC is superior to BTC there is no guarantee that this manifests itself in a bigger piece of the cake.

Really?  No kidding?

To me it only makes sense to have two main crypto-currencies.  With the new FinCEN statement I don't want to trade my BTC to usd or my LTC to usd.  I'd rather trade them back and forth between BTC/LTC to avoid capital gains taxes.  It is the solution to their ruling and makes sense to anyone that doesn't have their head in their ass or wants to be raped by Uncle Sam.

Edit: BTW, I don't think either BTC or LTC are superior to each other.  I think they both have their place and compliment each other well.  They both need each other now with regulations being put on them.  It's time to wake up people.

[peacefulmind]

A lot of people are waking up to the idea that for many reasons - Litecoin may be superior to Bitcoin on technical merits.

However - there needs to be Litecoin infrastructure built.

Some people may say that Natural Gas (CNG) powered cars are better and less polluting than gasoline/oil powered cars.

However Bitcoin(oil) has a headstart in infrastructure build out over Litecoin(CNG) we may very well end up with Bitcoin winning not because it was better but because it was first.

Though - that does not mean Litecoin is worthless - if you follow my energy analogy - crude oil trades for about $90 a barrel, natural gas still trades for $4/MCF.

Litecoin does have an opportunity coming - if in the next few months it can build infrastructure and leverage its larger more diversified miners, and the wider distribution of Litecoin holdings in the long run Litecoin could in fact overtake Bitcoin.

I however expect that the Gold/Silver analogy will remain a good one, and while Bitcoin may reach $1,000/BTC one day I think it is completely possible that LTC reaches at least 10% of that value.

Just my .02 LTC.  from experience in the energy industry where we DO NOT use what is BEST.

[Transisto]

A lot of people are waking up to the idea that for many reasons - Litecoin may be superior to Bitcoin on technical merits.

However - there needs to be Litecoin infrastructure built.

Some people may say that Natural Gas (CNG) powered cars are better and less polluting than gasoline/oil powered cars.

However Bitcoin(oil) has a headstart in infrastructure build out over Litecoin(CNG) we may very well end up with Bitcoin winning not because it was better but because it was first.

Though - that does not mean Litecoin is worthless - if you follow my energy analogy - crude oil trades for about $90 a barrel, natural gas still trades for $4/MCF.

Litecoin does have an opportunity coming - if in the next few months it can build infrastructure and leverage its larger more diversified miners, and the wider distribution of Litecoin holdings in the long run Litecoin could in fact overtake Bitcoin.

I however expect that the Gold/Silver analogy will remain a good one, and while Bitcoin may reach $1,000/BTC one day I think it is completely possible that LTC reaches at least 10% of that value.

Just my .02 LTC.   from experience in the energy industry where we DO NOT use what is BEST.

Having an infrastructure for exchanging between LTC and BTC is enough for it to thrive as an hedging tool for bitcoins.  For the same reason people withdraw just enough USD from BTC , someone can hold just enough BTC for it's online expenses.  That doesn't make use of LTC shorter confirmation but I think sCrypt is the most important feature of Litecoin.

[peacefulmind]

Having an infrastructure for exchanging between LTC and BTC is enough for it to thrive as an hedging tool for bitcoins.  For the same reason people withdraw just enough USD from BTC , someone can hold just enough BTC for it's online expenses.  That doesn't make use of LTC shorter confirmation but I think sCrypt is the most important feature of Litecoin.

Assuming Gox can get their act together and make good on promises RE: LTC then you are correct.  So much is riding on Gox carrying USD/LTC and BTC/LTC.

If it does LTC is eventually off to the races!

You will be correct that a hedging instrument is enough of a value proposition.  In many ways it already is.

I still think BTC will retain a preium for some time, but I feel as years pass the premium will diminish as people experience that LTC can be used just like BTC.

[solex]

Let's say it takes 1 minute for a block to globally propagate. This is sort of similar to how quickly BGP propagates and the BGP mesh is a comparable very large broadcast network. So now you waste 10% of all your work due to chain splits. With a 2.5 minute interval you're wasting nearly half your total work!

I think Mike has hit the nail on the head. What appears to be a strength of Litecoin is probably a major weakness. The 2.5min block time cripples its scalability by trying to solve a problem which doesn't really affect most merchants (waiting too long for confirmations).

[peacefulmind]

We will see soon as massive GPU power is re-directed away from BTC to LTC.

Hashrate has gone as high as 15,000,000Mh/s last night for LTC.  That is HUGE for scrypt.

[Ben Thomas Clayton]

Here is some interesting questions that needs an answer!

yes confirmation time

what are the odds of a transaction being reversed in bitcoin or litecoin?

lets say you accept a transaction from someone with zero confirmations, but you can see the transaction....

what can go wrong at this point?

can a transaction be faked? ie I am guessing you really do need to wait for one confirmation at least?

what are the odds of someone being able to fake a transaction that somehow manages to get one confirmation?

In other words, you have no idea what the risks are or what it takes for a transaction to be reasonably considered irreversible, yet you have the opinion that Litecoin does this faster than Bitcoin, specifically "much much faster". Does that sum things up? An uninformed opinion is not of very much value.

So far, the only person who's noticed this is a rude bugger who, in lack of a better mentality, didn't realize that these were new questions to enlighten things, so (s)he used them questions only to insult the one asking them...

[memvola]

Here is some interesting questions that needs an answer!

These questions are answered in any "How Bitcoin works" type of article.

I would try to respond item by item here, but the way they are asked betrays some ignorance about how the system works in general. So I would suggest reading about Bitcoin first, and then asking the parts which you don't understand or don't agree.

The "odds" could be considered an interesting question, but I don't understand what the asker meant. The PoW done on Bitcoin is immense, and none of the alternative currencies can really approach the low probabilities Bitcoin has. This won't produce interesting numbers for you. If the asker is in fact interested about potential differences in hypothetical cases, then s/he needs to clarify.