Is Bitcoin actually ready to go mainstream?

[bitbaby]

I think it is not a matter if bitcoin is ready for the people, it is a matter if people is ready for bitcoin.
The thing is, that common people are terriable with IT. We need a whole new generation of people, who has been brought up with computers, playing with tables since they could crawl.
Like metioned, most basic task as taking a screen shoot is complicated to the common joe.

when the new generation is grown up, and get in the age where they start to earn money... then is it time... it will be the new age of money. The age of bitcoin. I think it will take about 10-15 years.
My theorem is called "The tablet therom", take the time then the tablet pc became mainstream and add 20 years (for that generation to grew up). Then is it time.

Very well put. The next generation will be well suited for the Bitcoin, as people become more technologically advanced, they would prefer a currency like BTC, which they can keep/spend safely without the needs of banks.

Bitcoin is not ready to go mainstream and I am afraid that in its current state it never will be able. There are some problems with bitcoin that cannot be solved easily (or ever).
The main problem is long confirmation times. Usually confirmation time is not a issue at all and whole transaction is done in a minute. But there are times when it took more that 15 minutes.
And confirmation times cannot be lowered because it is part of bitcoin security system, lowering it would risk whole bitcoin network. So for now bitcoin may be good for online shopping but it won't be possible to buy groceries in supermarket with it probably. That is the problem.

You're right but maybe in future, you don't have to go stand in line at the grocery store. It can be ordered from home with Bitcoins and the Grocer can send it when the Tx has reached a certain number of confirmations.

[JackRipper]

...and it won't happen because bitcoin is implement a better anonymous tech in the future.

The transparency of the blockchain is one of Bitcoins greatest features. You can't have transparency and annonymity at the some time. Bitcoin will never be truly anonymous.

[futureofbitcoin]

bitcoin isn't ready, but it's not so much about the security aspects as about ease of use, ease of understanding and ease of obtaining bitcoins. You need to get people to understand what bitcoin is, and have an easy way to obtain a decent amount of it. Having do to faucets or sign campaigns for dust doesn't help, because people can't get enough to actually use bitcoin to buy anything.


There needs to be a must stronger bitcoin infrastructure and awareness before bitcoin can go mainstream.

[redsn0w]

bitcoin isn't ready, but it's not so much about the security aspects as about ease of use, ease of understanding and ease of obtaining bitcoins. You need to get people to understand what bitcoin is, and have an easy way to obtain a decent amount of it. Having do to faucets or sign campaigns for dust doesn't help, because people can't get enough to actually use bitcoin to buy anything.


There needs to be a must stronger bitcoin infrastructure and awareness before bitcoin can go mainstream.

So the problem is the value of the bitcoin itself, and the knowledge... am I right? I'm still thinking that bitcoin will never go mainstream because it was not created to 'go mainstream' but to be a good and alternative way (respect all the FIAT currencies and especially the actual economic system).

[ashour]

I don't think so, bitcoin is still complicated for the average Joe to use it. More bitcoin services which focus on the user friendliness will make bitcoin mainstream ready.

[Amph]

...and it won't happen because bitcoin is implement a better anonymous tech in the future.

The transparency of the blockchain is one of Bitcoins greatest features. You can't have transparency and annonymity at the some time. Bitcoin will never be truly anonymous.

it could be truly anonymous, but then it will be probably, banned from many countries, and seen as a terrorism tool only, which means that will never go mainstream

[manselr]

I don't think so, bitcoin is still complicated for the average Joe to use it. More bitcoin services which focus on the user friendliness will make bitcoin mainstream ready.

It's clearly far from mainstream use, but you can see the potential. QR codes come so handy when trying to do person to person payments. When BTC came out QR codes were still pretty weird and we had to deal with copy pasting long ass weird addresses, now QR codes save us. So steps are being taken into the right direction. In 10 years things will be so advance our minds would blow up right now if we could see it.

[coinableS]

Wow I'm surprised how many of you are so down on the current state of bitcoin technology.
I think it absolutely could go mainstream but not in the priv key wallet.dat form that most of us know. When it goes mainstream there will be many layers built on top of the existing bitcoin protocol similar to how the internet has several layers on top of it to make it usable by the mainstream.



What do you imagine this would look like if it were for mainstream bitcoin? I definitely think bitcoin core would be at the bottom, with several layers on top. Circle is a nice layer that makes it usable. Onename.io was a layer but nobody really caught on to using it. Changetip with twitter integration is a layer. This IMO is how bitcoin can be used by the mainstream.

[Billy Hlapinnio]

I don't think so, bitcoin is still complicated for the average Joe to use it. More bitcoin services which focus on the user friendliness will make bitcoin mainstream ready.

It's clearly far from mainstream use, but you can see the potential. QR codes come so handy when trying to do person to person payments. When BTC came out QR codes were still pretty weird and we had to deal with copy pasting long ass weird addresses, now QR codes save us. So steps are being taken into the right direction. In 10 years things will be so advance our minds would blow up right now if we could see it.

Complicated indeed. I can not imagine buying something major with bitcoins - like a house or a car.

[louise123]

Personally I don't think it's ready yet.
It is not even in version 1.0 yet.
That means that there's is a lot more things that need to be addressed.

Apart from that, it will take some time until the average joe is interested about Bitcoin.
Then for those who decide to use it, it's gonna take some time to learn how to use and protect their coins.

So, we still have a lot of time ahead of us.

[DavidHume]

Bitcoin isn't ready at all
First of all, who would wait 10 minutes for a confirmation
Second, who would use bitcoin if the bitcoin still very volatile

Other than those, i think there aren't any problem

I would wait 10 mins rather than a day for international transfer.

[Amph]

Bitcoin isn't ready at all
First of all, who would wait 10 minutes for a confirmation
Second, who would use bitcoin if the bitcoin still very volatile

Other than those, i think there aren't any problem

I would wait 10 mins rather than a day for international transfer.

cash is still faster though, you need to wait like 10 seconds to take them out of your pockets, and small shops need to wait for confirmations they can't accept pending deposit

[AtheistAKASaneBrain]

Bitcoin isn't ready at all
First of all, who would wait 10 minutes for a confirmation
Second, who would use bitcoin if the bitcoin still very volatile

Other than those, i think there aren't any problem

I would wait 10 mins rather than a day for international transfer.

cash is still faster though, you need to wait like 10 seconds to take them out of your pockets, and small shops need to wait for confirmations they can't accept pending deposit

Bitcoin will be as fast as cash. What time does it take to get a QR code scanned? because thats basically it to pay with a smartphone.

[LFC_Bitcoin]

Bitcoin needs to be easier to use before we achieve widespread/mainstream adoption.
Like some have said taking 2-3 days to download Bitcoin Core is ridiculous & if you don't sync it regularly you can be sitting there for a few hours before you can do anything.

I don't know how it's going to be done but it needs to be a lot easier for the average dumb ass.
Even trying to explain public & private keys to people is difficult.

[Amph]

Bitcoin isn't ready at all
First of all, who would wait 10 minutes for a confirmation
Second, who would use bitcoin if the bitcoin still very volatile

Other than those, i think there aren't any problem

I would wait 10 mins rather than a day for international transfer.

cash is still faster though, you need to wait like 10 seconds to take them out of your pockets, and small shops need to wait for confirmations they can't accept pending deposit

Bitcoin will be as fast as cash. What time does it take to get a QR code scanned? because thats basically it to pay with a smartphone.

the problem are the confirmations not how fast is the transaction itself, because we know that this is instantaneous, so yeah you scan the qr, transaction go in less than a sec then you need to wait 1 to 6 confirmations depends on the shop...not practical

unless everyone begin to accept uncofirmed transactions

but this is only a problem with real life shops, i believe bitcoin will have two mainstream phase, one online(where confirmation time does not matter that much) and the second "offline", and with this we may need an hard fork or something else to resolve this issue about slow conf...

[hellyeah]

Bitcoin isn't ready at all
First of all, who would wait 10 minutes for a confirmation
Second, who would use bitcoin if the bitcoin still very volatile

Other than those, i think there aren't any problem

I would wait 10 mins rather than a day for international transfer.

cash is still faster though, you need to wait like 10 seconds to take them out of your pockets, and small shops need to wait for confirmations they can't accept pending deposit

That is true, and confirmation times IS an issue, regardless of the fact that the international transfers are faster than banks.
It's not just about money transfers, it's about POS purchases as well.

[aeno19]

In my opininon,

its almost mainstream,
because lots of payment are made trough bitcoin...

[btcbobby]

No. For one, while the core and protocol are likely ready, or will be once the blocksize increases, applications need to be created that simplify the experience for end users.

Which gets to point two: even if/when the protocol and attendant apps are all polished and ready for the nainstream, people will need to be efucTed/re educated about the pitfalls, the differences between btc and fiat, security, etc. otherwise the transition from fiat to btc will end up resulting in large scale thefts and losses.

[thejaytiesto]

Im actually hopping that it gets delayed as much as possible. We the people that are already within the crypto ecosystem can only but benefit from it being as delayed as possible, who wants to have a lot of people coming in right now? We can benefit from this low price for at least an entire year or more, which im ok with.

[RodeoX]

It needs a few more killer apps, IMO.