[MARKETING]Get ZeroHedge to publish an article about Bitcoin

[sippsnapp]

Great idea indeed, brings bitcoin to the attention of a lot smart heads.

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[marcus_of_augustus]

acoindr :

Okay, I finally got around to completing an article for Zero Hedge. Please let me know any suggestions. Also, does anyone have a ZH account for submission? It looks like it takes 4 to 7 days for new account approval. If nobody has an account I'll create one there and submit. I hereby release this into the public domain. Please feel free to use as you like.

I can get this published at zerohedge if you still want to .... is that the final draft?

[unclescrooge]

you really have to address the "if you don't hold it, you don't own it" idea.

if you alone have the private keys - you hold it. fullstop.

unlike gold certificates. precious metals are substituted with paper very easily because they are hard to use in actual transactions. bitcoin overcomes this barrier because they are made to transact.

Good point. That could be a concern among traditional gold bugs.

Question is, should we really be targetting the "gold bug" demographic? Zerohedge seems to have other groups in its audience as well, and marketing Bitcoin as being too similar to gold could put them off. A common misinterpretation of the "21 million coins" limit seems to be that the coins are indivisible. And how do we make newbies read the damn FAQ, when everyone thinks they're a financial guru?

One suggestion that comes to mind is pitching the article as a call for more developers to join in, and really make positive use of Bitcoin's beta tag. Bitcoinica turned out to be a bit of an embarrassment, so here's an opportunity to do something better with Bitcoin.

Edit: they seem to love busting scams at ZH, so let's get their brains working on something productive for once ;-)

I think there are also on ZeroHegde an audience aware of the financial disaster coming, and it would be good to show how bitcoins feature can help them preserve their capital from this.

[marcus_of_augustus]

Differentiating bitcoin from state-monopoly currencies issued by centrally-planned banking systems is a good way to draw a parallel with gold without attacking the shibboleth of the gold standard (also a state-sanctioned monopoly currency but best not go there with this article maybe)

bitcoin = decentralised, free market-based currency.

[acoindr]

Hey everyone,

Thanks for the interest in this.

@marcus_of_augustus: no I don't think it's a final draft. I believe @DutchBrat is submitting it to ZH to get their feedback on it to see if they would publish it, or perhaps prefer a different writing angle. If you know you can get any type article published that's awesome! We just need to figure out what that article should be.

My goal with the article was introducing Bitcoin, which is an immensely information rich topic, in a fairly concise way while piquing newbie interest to explore it. I was conscious of article length. Everyone is coming up with great ideas for what the article might contain, but remember it can't contain everything. Typical ZH articles seem to be fairly short. That's a reason I didn't suggest using @evoorhees's Libertarian Primer on Bitcoin which I loved, and is comprehensive, but I think too long for ZH.

So right now I'm thinking we see how this week progresses, what kind of feedback we get from ZH about a Bitcoin article. I'm really not familiar with their audience.

[bb113]

I really think it should be written from the perspective of "be your own bank"... and offer actionable info. Then again I don't feel like writing it so feel free to ignore me.

[acoindr]

@blablahblah - nice alternative article.

I like the stylized edgy feel to it, and how it delivers in a roundabout witty way. I think it could definitely be well received if the ZH audience likes that style.

[TraderTimm]

Not bad, it reaches a new audience readily enough. My tack would be a bit different. A lot of those guys are running trade desks and funds. I'd put up a cost-analysis on trading the arb in bitcoin, and when you got to the friction involving moving funds to other exchanges, show how opening your own exchange in a country that doesn't require too much overhead would improve the total picture.

That could whet the appetite for some of the financial types to start registering services, if only to trade it.

[labestiol]

Thanks for your work guys ! That's indeed something we need to do.

A few suggestions :

Show the graph of currency supply. Also pointing that the supply is going to be cut in half soon could attract people.
In the part about the hacks, pointing that the problem was never the protocol/satoshi client
ZH is probably a good target for the "Screw Banks" videos, so we should use it. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CrOKDOyW-Y)
Don't remember who said that, but the analogy of bitcoin being both the blood and veins, ie both a currency and a transaction system is nice

[Melbustus]

Lots of good ideas... Below is my take, which approaches the introduction of bitcoin from a macro-economic "the current system is broken" standpoint. I read zerohedge somewhat often, and I believe this fits very nicely with the existing economic consensus of the zerohedge crowd, and also has the benefit of not requiring an up-front in-depth explanation of bitcoin. Obviously there is A LOT to potentially convey about bitcoin; far too much for a single introductory article. Positioning bitcoin as the solution to the current broken fiat money system seems like the right approach to me. The ZH crowd should agree with the background thesis by default, and therefore be, at minimum, intrigued by the theoretical notion of bitcoin, hopefully enough to look into it further:

Better Money

As the world deals with $200 trillion in debt, with most "advanced" economies relying on a democracy-fiat system that represents a one-way mathematical function toward a debt spiral, it is obvious to many that our current worldwide money system is broken. The current run to US bonds is not a flight to "safety," but a flight to the current "lesser of evils." Politicians from Greece to the US promise more and more while allowing the free market to produce less and less. Rational people are seeing that the crash of '08 is a mere precursor to the ultimate and inevitable worldwide sovereign debt disaster. A better system is needed.

A better system starts with better money. Money that doesn't give election-cycle prioritizing politicians free reign to promise the world to the masses while delivering nothing but debt and inflation. Many advocate a return to the gold standard in order to tie politicians' hands, while others propose various revisions to the Fed and other central banks. However, as is often the case, the market itself has developed, and is increasingly embracing, a powerful solution that's growing from the bottom up: bitcoin.

Consider a monetary system that offers perfect information. A system that broadcasts its intentions to the world with mathematical perfection. A system whose formula cannot be manipulated by politicans (or anyone, for that matter), thereby eliminating the entire notion of monetary uncertainty. A system that offers what gold and other classical "hard money" offers: limited supply, divisibility, portability, homogeneity, recognizability, durability...but which is also fit for the modern electronic world where funds zip across the Internet and most money is simply an account entry "in the books."

Sound too good to be true? Perhaps. But while none of the world's debt problems have been solved and while Mr. Bernake contemplates buying up yet another round of Uncle Sam's bonds, the bitcoin experiment quietly grows, rejecting the entire theoretical basis of fiat currency and a politically-controlled elastic money supply.

Bitcoin is a decentralized, mathematically fixed-supply currency. Through its use of indisputable cryptography, it has made possible, for the first time in human history, a money supply that cannot be altered by any central authority. It is also fully designed for the modern electronic era. Sending funds internationally no longer requires a hefty wire-transfer fee, several hours (if not days), and transmission of sensitive identity and account information through an insecure electronic banking system. Senders and receivers of bitcoin can be anywhere in the world.  People can quickly, easily, securely, and psuedo-anonymously send bitcoin to each other over the Internet from myriad devices (computers, tablets, phones, etc). Bitcoin is how money should work in the modern economy.

The bitcoin experiment is young, and its future is unknown. But it doesn't take too much vision to see that, like the fledgling Internet of the late 1980s, it has the power to disrupt the status quo like few innovations before it. Control of money need not be in the hands of government. The Internet democratized and decentralized information. Bitcoin democratizes and decentralizes money.

[n8rwJeTt8TrrLKPa55eU]

Positioning bitcoin as the solution to the current broken fiat money system seems like the right approach to me.

Agreed that Bitcoin is part of the solution, I would just expand that to Bitcoin+Gold and not Bitcoin by itself, as with that combo all possible armageddon insurance scenarios are covered and, most importantly, it will make the goldbug part of the ZH audience more receptive.  They already understand why the system will fail, and why gold is needed as insurance.  All we need to do is explain the scenarios where gold fails (transport, divisibility, detectability, storage) and how Bitcoin works well in those scenarios.

[Melbustus]

Positioning bitcoin as the solution to the current broken fiat money system seems like the right approach to me.

Agreed that Bitcoin is part of the solution, I would just expand that to Bitcoin+Gold and not Bitcoin by itself, as with that combo all possible armageddon insurance scenarios are covered and, most importantly, it will make the goldbug part of the ZH audience more receptive.  They already understand why the system will fail, and why gold is needed as insurance.  All we need to do is explain the scenarios where gold fails (transport, divisibility, detectability, storage) and how Bitcoin works well in those scenarios.

Yeah, I did mention Gold as one potential solution. I didn't position bitcoin and gold as mutually-exclusive. I certainly see your point, but I think it's a bit laborious to get into the gold discussion at all. The point of the piece should be to simply explain what bitcoin is monetarily, thereby piquing their interest (hopefully). They can then do their own research/analysis to decide what's what wrt bitcoin+gold. Despite lots ZH readers being gold bugs, a lot are simply open-minded people who recognize that the current system is broken. Maybe this is optimistic (and it's definitely a very limited sample set), but the guys I know who read ZH regularly are genuinely interested in what's going on and are curious to read alternative economic viewpoints.

[istar]

Why should you learn everything you possibly can about Bitcoin?
Let me give you four reasons.

1. As Bitcoin spreads like a viral each coin could easily go to $100-$5000.
You simply do not want to be left in the dust if/when that happens.
2. You and everyone around you need a digital system with sound electronic money, you own. Not the corrupt banking kartel.
A system of money not created out of thin air but out of energy.

3. It might be unstoppable.

As long as there is atleast one person who have downloaded the blockchain containing every single transaction. Which you do with the default program.
The network can allways start again.
Why? Because anyone can forward transactions by mining. This means that Bitcoin could
be virtually unstoppable.


Something like that.

[c0in$]

I have a draft of something that could be used for zerohedge as well.  It would have to do with incentive restructuring, and the elimination of wealth concentration and centralization without requisite transparency that drives accountability and how bitcoin fits into this.  I have a zero hedge account as well.

[WikileaksDude]

I have a draft of something that could be used for zerohedge as well.  It would have to do with incentive restructuring, and the elimination of wealth concentration and centralization without requisite transparency that drives accountability and how bitcoin fits into this.  I have a zero hedge account as well.

That would be nice. Make sure to talk about the fees, how nobody can really profit from them on the transfers.

[n8rwJeTt8TrrLKPa55eU]

Earlier today ZeroHedge had an exchange with John Aziz on Twitter, referencing Bitcoin.

Aziz pro, ZH skeptical citing old Wired article as evidence:

https://twitter.com/zerohedge/status/240766618622386176

Aziz then turned his tweet into an article, with a tiny side Bitcoin mention:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-currency-competition

But based on this evidence, it looks like any Bitcoin submission to ZeroHedge needs to include a paragraph pre-debunking the Wired article.  And expect hostility.

Maybe the title should be "Why Bitcoin Is Needed, Is Maturing, and Isn't a Ponzi"

Addendum: 2 of the article comments ask for Bitcoin coverage:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-currency-competition#comment-2747740

[k9quaint]

You should probably wait until the top 3 Bitcoin stories include something that is not a Ponzi scheme that swindled a bunch of people who are incapable of due diligence.

A second order problem is that right now (AFAICS) Bitcoin's largest problem is that a large portion of it's user base is very susceptible to confidence scams. Recruiting extremophiles  from ZeroHedge into the Bitcoin user base is probably not a solution to that problem and might even be counter-productive.

[labestiol]

Actually, a story about a ponzi scheme in bitcoin may not be so much of a bad publicity for bitcoin. You can argue it's a definite proof it has value And it's a good occasion to debunk the fact that bitcoin in itself is not a ponzi.
Also, attracting people from ZH might be a way to make the community less susceptible to scams. Pretty sure the average ZH reader would reach the good conclusion when he'll see 7%/weeks.

I've read the comments in the competing currencies posts, it seems to be getting better (except if all the commenters come from here  )

Anyway, seems that the Tyler who responded on twitter is not confident about bitcoin. Maybe for now a better way to introduce bitcoin on ZH is through contributors (Thanks John Aziz if you read this)

[k9quaint]

Actually, a story about a ponzi scheme in bitcoin may not be so much of a bad publicity for bitcoin. You can argue it's a definite proof it has value And it's a good occasion to debunk the fact that bitcoin in itself is not a ponzi.

Inception ponzi. Maybe Bitcoin consists of ponzis within a ponzi?

Also, attracting people from ZH might be a way to make the community less susceptible to scams. Pretty sure the average ZH reader would reach the good conclusion when he'll see 7%/weeks.

They will probably come to the conclusion that Bitcoin consists of scammers shearing sheep and little else and stay away. Those who would come on board in the middle of such bad press worry me. A more fertile ground to recruit Bitcoiners might be Forex & Currency arbitrage sites. There at least you can point to a legitimate use of BTC.

[marcus_of_augustus]

There at least you can point to a legitimate use of BTC.

.... and by implication wealth protection and escape from oppressive monetary regimes (to name but a few) are not "legitimate" uses for BTC ... huh?