What would happen if

[ea73]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

[talkbitcoin]

the idea of bitcoin giveaway through giving away paper wallets with private keys and some small amounts on them have been discussed here before.

and in my opinion, i think it is a bad idea because people will sell the coins for fiat as their first act. it may help bitcoin become the headlines and increase the popularity for a short time and for a small amount but i don't think it can help the adoption at all.

[amacar2]

The main question will be whether those bitcoin address hold any amount of bitcoin or not. If it hold bitcoin in those address than few may only pick it up in developed countries like in USA but if it is dropped in developing or underdeveloped countries than all of those cards will be picked up within few hour.

[franky1]

Would this act be permitted by law?

littering: on the spot fine per business card

[dothebeats]

If I were to receive such from some random wealthy businessman, I would be grateful and just exchange it for fiat afterwards. That would be the reaction of most who will receive it, honestly, and that might not help bitcoin's adoption even at the slightest. It would be a major headline, but it ends there.

Would this act be permitted by law?

littering: on the spot fine per business card

Yep. Aaaand, be environmental friendly, you rich dickheads. Imagine all the trees you help cut just for those cards.

[thisappointed]

For me, I think it is not illegal because it's just a give away from those rich people unless they've got the money from illegal activities that's the time that it will going to be illegal. It will be a blessing to all of the bitcoin users because it would only happens once in a blue moon and they are all lucky if they didn't miss this day. If this is going to be published on the public, there's a possibility that more people would be interested in bitcoin and they will start on doing it also.

[BitcoinHodler]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

first of all the giving away money (bitcoin) for free is never a good idea if you ask me especially if it is done like this. which is why i say instead of throwing money at people it is a lot better if there is like a seminar, convention, or whatever you want to call it about bitcoin and in that after explaining about bitcoin give away some paper wallets.

[aso118]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

first of all the giving away money (bitcoin) for free is never a good idea if you ask me especially if it is done like this. which is why i say instead of throwing money at people it is a lot better if there is like a seminar, convention, or whatever you want to call it about bitcoin and in that after explaining about bitcoin give away some paper wallets.

Giving money away is not a good idea? Quantitative easing essentially does that.
And Central Bankers all over the world are falling over each other, trying to outdo each other in this game.

[springgers]

Who will use a private key that someone can know?

Neither newbies.

And it sounds like physical spam.

[dollarneed]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

Last month there was a giveaway held by The Blockchain Education Network (BEN) in four Chicago Universities, i think is a good way if people giving free bitcoin for educational purpose, this is literally introduce and increase the adoption of the bitcoin, but giving away without any explanation bout what is exactly bitcoin i think this the problem, people would only see that the card that they're just giving it's only money not payment processor nor investment tool.

[AicecreaME]

It would be a great opportunity for the bitcoin users to make this event successful by grabbing this giveaways and then this will become trending online having the title "Wealthy business men, bitcoin giveaways for the bitcoin users." and many people will be interested and they will be curious about bitcoin and then there will be a time that they will start using it. In that way, bitcoin will be more popular and I assume that it's price will go up high more than the price that it has in the past few years.

[BitcoinHodler]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

first of all the giving away money (bitcoin) for free is never a good idea if you ask me especially if it is done like this. which is why i say instead of throwing money at people it is a lot better if there is like a seminar, convention, or whatever you want to call it about bitcoin and in that after explaining about bitcoin give away some paper wallets.

Giving money away is not a good idea? Quantitative easing essentially does that.
And Central Bankers all over the world are falling over each other, trying to outdo each other in this game.

i have not heard this term before in English but reading about it, i still keep my word and say "giving away free money to people" is not a good idea. especially if you are giving away free bitcoin since that is the topic here.
i am not talking about the economical problems of doing this but only about bitcoin giveaway part which is bad because they will just dump the coins for fiat and transfer that fiat into their banks or many may not even bother checking it out if it is like a couple of bucks worth of bitcoin.

[Vaccinus]

what law? it's not like only american law matter, it depend on the country

[7788bitcoin]

At the max, each card will have 21 million BTC / 1 billion = 0.021BTC. But it is basically not possible for one person or one organisation to own all BTC. If the someone is willing to buy up to 1 million BTC, each card will have 1mBTC but the price will be pump up significantly.

[Kprawn]

I have watched a TV series once, where they tested human behaviour in different situations. { I cannot remember the name tho } They

offered something for free, or at a VERY low price... and most people did not trust the offer and simply walked away. We are daily

bombarded with FREE offers, and we have learned through experience, that nothing are really FREE. There is always something attached

to FREE offers. A Bitcoin Air drop like this, will raise suspicion and people will walk away. 

[franky1]

and we have learned through experience, that nothing are really FREE. There is always something attached to FREE offers,

not everyone is aware of "nothing are really FREE". otherwise people wouldnt get viruses trojans and scammed.

however back to the OP's idea
i do find it funny though. advertising electronic currency publicly..... using paper!!

id prefer to set up a projector and beam a QR code onto the side of a large white walled building where people walking by would scan the QR code and get directions on how to download a wallet and get some free bitcoins deposited into an address.

<unrelated to bitcoin but for display purposes>

[apoorvlathey]

some wealthy entrepreneur decided to drop a total of 1 billion business cards, having a blank bitcoin address and its private key on each side of them, from air to ten major cities of usa? Would the common folks be interested in using these cards as regular money? Would this act be permitted by law?

First of all, would the people be able to recognize the btc address and the private key? To them it would be only few random digits on a card. They would not know its value !
Instead it would be much better if they would be educated about this cryptocurrency and then given small amounts just to learn its usage.

[bitbunnny]

I don't know if this would be illegal, probably not, but would people know what exactly are they getting and how to use it. Not everyone is familiar with Bitcoin andw know it's value and how to use it. But on the other hand something like this would be good to promote it.

[Hazir]

I am against giving people free money and bitcoin = money. The only exception is when it is linked with education or when there is literally no way or obtaining BTC in any way.

People who would received Bitcoins for free won't value it and would think it is some kind of fake virtual currency - therefore they received it for free.
 

[lionheart78]

the idea of bitcoin giveaway through giving away paper wallets with private keys and some small amounts on them have been discussed here before.

and in my opinion, i think it is a bad idea because people will sell the coins for fiat as their first act. it may help bitcoin become the headlines and increase the popularity for a short time and for a small amount but i don't think it can help the adoption at all.

I have the same opinion regarding this matter, and I think it will be better if this billionaire creates and event instead inviting media and lots of computer literate people then introduce bitcoin and at the same time give this paper wallets as a giveaway.  At least in this kind of strategy, people will be aware of bitcoin and its usage.