After Paypal... Amazon, ebay locked out of Argentina.

[flix]

Paypal recently blocked Argentinians from p2p transactions due to government capital and currency controls. Now online retailers like Amazon, ebay and Pioneer have been blocked from Argentina as well. This could be a huge opportunity for bitcoin... a whole country that has the same problem as wikileaks! Virgin territory in which Bitcoin could become a market leader.. and a testing ground for what could be done in many other places as government controls tighten.

Is anyone thinking of doing something about this?


http://www.latercera.com/noticia/negocios/2012/09/655-485015-9-amazon-ebay-y-payoneer-suspenden-operaciones-en-argentina-por-trabas-cambiarias.shtml

[HostFat]

Someone should make a service like this:
http://www.osalt.com
But instead open source alternatives, it will have Bitcoin alternatives, example:
eBay
- bitmit
paypal
- Bitpay
- mtgox

Users should be able to add common used services, and then possible alternatives.
It must be possible also to vote alternatives.

[flix]

Since there's also considerable restrictions on buying gold in Argentina, it would also be nice to see http://coinabul.com/ get a local partner and open a franchise there....

Or given the level of paranoia of the Argentine govt. maybe Silk Road should open a peso-bitcoin exchange! It will be a good test of bitcoin resilience to govt. stupidity because you can be sure of Kirchner's immediate knee-jerk reaction if this becomes a big thing.

[garyrowe]

I'm currently working on MultiBit Merchant (see https://github.com/gary-rowe/MultiBitMerchant/wiki/Introduction) which might go some way to helping local merchants operate their own businesses directly in Bitcoin.

As part of my "October of Bitcoin" I'll be working to bring it up to MVP status in the next 30 days. This will involve me taking an entire month off work (unpaid) to dedicate my efforts full time to the project. If anyone would like to help out I need folks with Java and HTML/CSS/JavaScript skills.

I maintain a blog about it here: http://gary-rowe.com/agilestack/2012/06/06/multibit-merchant-genesis/

Once I'm getting close to something useful for people I'll post a proper announcement and support thread.

[Come-from-Beyond]

If anyone would like to help out I need folks with Java and HTML/CSS/JavaScript skills.

What exactly do u need to be done?

EDIT: Do u need folks coz u have no enough time or u need to solve a complicated technical issue?

[markm]

Someone should make a service like this:
http://www.osalt.com
But instead open source alternatives, it will have Bitcoin alternatives, example:
eBay
- bitmit
paypal
- Bitpay
- mtgox

Users should be able to add common used services, and then possible alternatives.
It must be possible also to vote alternatives.

So does Open Source Alternatives mention any Open Source alternatives to PayPal et al?

If not, why not? (And why would we want to be like them if they don't like us! )

-MarkM-

[flix]

This Bitcoin Argentina group looks like it's growing...
http://www.facebook.com/groups/btcarg/

[fivemileshigh]

This would apply to most totalitarian states, not just Argentina:

Would the bitcoins to be bought wits pesos not effectively have to be mined IN Argentina? I know there's no physical requirement, but also most people outside of Argentina would have no use for the pesos, so the pesos price of btc would be quite high outside the country, leading to an opportunity for a local miner.

Can argentinians exchange pesos for dollars and send the dollars to Mtgox?

[kjlimo]

This would apply to most totalitarian states, not just Argentina:

Would the bitcoins to be bought wits pesos not effectively have to be mined IN Argentina? I know there's no physical requirement, but also most people outside of Argentina would have no use for the pesos, so the pesos price of btc would be quite high outside the country, leading to an opportunity for a local miner.

Can argentinians exchange pesos for dollars and send the dollars to Mtgox?

While I have not followed the forex markets closely, I assume the markets would be efficient (within 20-30% and close any margins between currencies.

[majamalu]

Can argentinians exchange pesos for dollars and send the dollars to Mtgox?

Buying foreign currency is banned in Argentina.

[WikileaksDude]

Someone should make a service like this:
http://www.osalt.com
But instead open source alternatives, it will have Bitcoin alternatives, example:
eBay
- bitmit
paypal
- Bitpay
- mtgox

Users should be able to add common used services, and then possible alternatives.
It must be possible also to vote alternatives.

Couple others that could easily substitute paypal: https://paysius.com/ & https://bitspend.eu/

or simply tools: https://walletbit.com/ & http://acceptbit.com/

[Coinabul]

Since there's also considerable restrictions on buying gold in Argentina, it would also be nice to see http://coinabul.com/ get a local partner and open a franchise there....

Or given the level of paranoia of the Argentine govt. maybe Silk Road should open a peso-bitcoin exchange! It will be a good test of bitcoin resilience to govt. stupidity because you can be sure of Kirchner's immediate knee-jerk reaction if this becomes a big thing.

Do you live in Argentina?

[thezerg]

This would apply to most totalitarian states, not just Argentina:

Would the bitcoins to be bought wits pesos not effectively have to be mined IN Argentina? I know there's no physical requirement, but also most people outside of Argentina would have no use for the pesos, so the pesos price of btc would be quite high outside the country, leading to an opportunity for a local miner.

Can argentinians exchange pesos for dollars and send the dollars to Mtgox?

Yeah, this seems to be the key issue that will hit any country that does not have BTC in the wild when TSHTF.   Greece, etc will probably also have this issue.  But BTC could trickle in for payment of IT services... especially since the event might make the labor rates very attractive in the global market.

[giszmo]

If nobody wants Pesos outside the country resulting in a 20% margin nobody wants to/can arbitrage down, think "remittance":
In such a scenario, relatives can send BTC in and not only have zero costs in the transaction but even get 20% more Pesos for their dollars instead of paying 20% fees which is not uncommon for many remittance payments. The trickier the country, the more you pay for the established providers and in turn the more BTC might be valued in the country.
To make this happen, you need a distribution system in the respective country so people that need to convert their store of value into shopping tokens can do that on short notice.