Dear Bitcointalk Community, please change your perspective about Bitcoin!

[hajimasan]

I'm writing this post because I see it everywhere on this forum. People who just talk about Bitcoin pump(s), $ price, € price and so on... even most legendary members do it!


I think most Bitcoin users miss what Bitcoin really is and what Satoshi wanted it to be.
If you read the white paper, there's no mention about Bitcoin as a digital asset. Satoshi just wanted to create a payment system, a strong one and much better than the traditional ones.

But right now, Bitcoin is mainly considered as a digital asset, digital gold, just an investment tool to make (quick) profit. That's wrong, in my opinion.

I think Bitcoin users are raping Satoshi's original view, thinking only about BTC's value on exchanges.


What most don't understand is that Satoshi gave us a huge power. The power to destroy and make disappear forever the whole old banking system, other online payment systems like paypal and maybe governments too. Forever.

He gave us the power to decentralize everything using the blockchain technology. In short, Satoshi gave us the power the change the world for the better.


So why are you focusing only on Bitcoin's price on exchanges?


Imagine this.

A world where you can send money anywhere and to anyone in the world, instantly and with low fees.
A world where you can buy anything using Bitcoin, from coffees to yatchs.
A world where you can get all the privacy you want.
A world without banks.
A world without old currencies, that only create inflation.
A world where you pay only the taxes you wanna pay and not what you are forced to pay.


I think Satoshi's original view was very revolutionary.
A decentralized payment system and a deflationary currency. A real digital cash.


But now, Bitcoin has becomed just a digital asset. Maybe a toy for rich people to get even richer.
What's so revolutionary about it? The world is already full of assets and investment tool...


In short, Bitcoin lost most of its revolutionary appeal.

I strongly suggest you to change your consideration about Bitcoin. Now it's time to choose, because what we - as a community - decide now will influence all the future history of Bitcoin.


So, what do you prefer? A brick of gold or a better world?

yes bitcoin is not only about price and making profit and even some think bitcoin as investment to make profit but not at all such. People buy bitcoin and keep hold those bitcoin to sell when price gets up but actually the main intention of satoshi was to make the world revolutionize so he had introduced such currency to make hassle free transaction across the world and with full privacy and security but we the common people had managed to make profit only.
Yes kore it's the tume to change our perspective and we should see bitcoin as currency instead of money making and investment. Bitcoin is simple a currency and we should use it in our day to day life where ever possible do that out next generation could go cashless and that with secure technology.

And i am impressed with your forward steps towards bitcoin and yes together we can make the change if we have positive thinking and efforts. And we should start the journey of cashless transaction and in future wr could take pride that yes we did it nad the world is following us.

[Boseda]

And they are right.  They have seen that bitcoin is not what it claimed to be, namely a freedom money which would scare the hell out of them (and which it did, in the early years), but is a system designed for greedy people to play speculative games on.  And that's what they like. The greedy people playing speculative games (which is how bitcoin was designed, with huge initial emission, and later restricted amount of coins) are the ones cheering when there's regulation ("this will increase the adoption of bitcoin, and increase the price and allow me to become even more wealthy sitting on my arse and my stash"), they are the ones causing huge volatility making bitcoin unsuitable as a currency, and they are the ones causing returns on investment on bitcoin that will make financial institutions play the game too.
Because bitcoin was designed to be a greedy people's toy in a greater fool game, and not a currency.  Because of its huge initial supply, and its restricted emission in the future.

Moreover, bitcoin has now killed all possibilities to create a real freedom currency.  Bitcoin will be hailed by the powers that be as the tool that ended their nightmare of someone inventing a freedom currency.  Banks will praise it as the speculative tools that replaces those they were taken away after their 2007 crisis.

I still believe Satoshi's original view was to revolutionize the world and maybe destroy all the old financial system, not to build - as you said - "a system designed for greedy people to play speculative games on". But we'll never know what Satoshi really thought and also it's kinda useless to know it. He gave all the Bitcoin power to us and now it's only up to us.

I'm also still optimistic and I truly believe Bitcoin could still be the "freedom currency" we dream about. But changing the consideration people have about Bitcoin won't be easy though...

[ChiBitCTy]

If Bitcoin was more widely accepted as a medium to purchase goods (at least here in the United States) then the viewing of Bitcoin as a mere investment or commodity wouldn't be as strong as it is.  I see more good than bad here however. The skyrocketing value means more people are getting involved in Bitcoin  and it's hard to see how that could be a bad thing at this point in time. As someone who's been involved(buying, selling, using as a purchasing method, researcher etc) with Bitcoin for the past 2 years (as well as a financial advisor) I've recently had several friends reach out to me with all sorts of questions. I would say half of them are investors and half are "want to be" enthusiasts in its tech/decentralization/payment medium aspects.  There is no possible way that Bitcoin could have steadily grown in users/value without this "investment" aspect. In many ways it's acting just like an exciting stock that promises big things moving forward. With stocks there will always be buyers and sellers (as there are with government controlled currencies). 

The way I see it, things could be so much worse off than they currently are (if you're upset with the investors simply looking to make a profit).  BTC is still in its infancy and this will continue to some extent for years to come. At least I sure hope it does because that is what's realistic and if it doesn't..then it likely means it has failed. Just my 2.

[haroldtee]

And that is not true. Come to Africa and we will convince you to use bitcoin. I am an African, precisely Nigeria and I know the rate at which bitcoin is going viral down here. Everyday, people ask questions about bitcoin and I have never seen a week that I haven't discussed bitcoin anywhere I find myself. Wanna check out the payment systems exchanging bitcoin to my currency everyday? You have no idea. I don't know why you must have mentioned that but that notion is totally wrong.

are you inner city talking to the rich..
or actually talking to normal people.

people 'discussing/asking about bitcoin' is different than people USING bitcoin

how many have actually used bitcoin (without hoarding in exchanges) to notice the tx fee to move funds is more than some people weeks wage.

i have spoken to many people in many countries.. they love the premiss of bitcoin, its original ethos and ideology, but when it comes to actually using it. they start to notice the flaws. the only people that then continue to want bitcoin are those too afraid to cash out or too greedy to cash out due to hopes of 'becoming rich' in the future.

bitcoin has lost all its ideology as a currency and 3rd world/developing countries are usually first to point out this fact once they get passed the sales pitch and start using it. finding its not a 'daily life' currency like Mpesa. but instead a retirement plan

it seems even you yourself recognise the issues

Bitcoin is gradually becoming non-affordable for lower class for transaction purposes unless they just want to buy very little and keep as an investment. Moreover, the very little one can buy from most exchange sites, is still a bit on the high side. Also, transaction fees are increasing by the day, which is quite appalling. Best way to just get bitcoin now for lower masses is just to partake in stuffs that makes them earn bitcoin if they are well informed enough. So back to his question! In a way it is available to all levels of society and in a way it isn't.

I totally understand your perspective and you are right. Like you said, it is gradually loosing its ideology as currency and most people are beginning to view it now as an asset rather than a means of transaction. The reason why I use Bitcoin to make transaction today is because I do a lot of foreign transactions, which I still feel is faster, easier and better compared to the likes of western union or restriction of my country's foreign transaction limit. Hardly will you see people globally now not hoarding their Bitcoin believing in its power to make them rich in future. I can't say they are greedy, that is just human nature. I thought about it too that if I had not used it as a transaction in the past, then maybe I would have been richer by now. Most people using bitcoin are the rich ones who believed it aids them in transacting, not the masses who wants to get rich quickly (that's how some people are seeing it now anyway...  A Get-Rich-Quick scheme).

[vrm86]

There are two things regarding this problem, that I can think of:
1. Transaction fees - it's really discouraging to pay several dollars to perform payment. You can choose to wait unspecified amount of time if fee would be too low. Alts or even bank transfers are more reliable at the moment.
2. That's how free market works. If we expect from BTC to be wide adopted, it's obvious, that demand could exceed supply. I think, that Satoshi made Bitcoin divisible by 100 millions with purpose

[Boseda]

there is no harm too if bitcoin serve as an investment asset .

Ok, but just think about the forex market. Are the currencies you trade on forex markets considered digital assets or long-term investments?

Look at paypal, western union, skrill, are they considered long-term investments?

If we want Bitcoin to overcome other currencies and payments systems, we need to consider Bitcoin just like we consider the other things I mentioned above: ie a currency and a payment system.

Otherwise, consider it as a digital asset, compare it to gold and forget about using it for your daily transaction...

[dinofelis]

If Bitcoin was more widely accepted as a medium to purchase goods (at least here in the United States) then the viewing of Bitcoin as a mere investment or commodity wouldn't be as strong as it is.  I see more good than bad here however. The skyrocketing value means more people are getting involved in Bitcoin  and it's hard to see how that could be a bad thing at this point in time. As someone who's been involved(buying, selling, using as a purchasing method, researcher etc) with Bitcoin for the past 2 years (as well as a financial advisor) I've recently had several friends reach out to me with all sorts of questions. I would say half of them are investors and half are "want to be" enthusiasts in its tech/decentralization/payment medium aspects.  There is no possible way that Bitcoin could have steadily grown in users/value without this "investment" aspect.

Of course it could have.  In fact, it would even have been easier.  The thing that was needed, was NOT to have automatic difficulty adjustement, but to have a programmed difficulty curve, and NOT have a diminishing block reward.  That would actually have made the code and protocol simpler.  In fact, one could even have modified it: the difficulty of a block depends on how much block reward you want to give yourself !

Imagine that it takes about, say, $10 000.- to mine a block in which you give yourself a block reward of 1 BTC.  It takes so much in hardware and electricity, the difficulty has been set that way.  But you could then also mine a block with a reward of 1 mBTC, and that would only cost you $10.-.  People could mine as many blocks as they want ; they could publish a block every 3 seconds if they want to.  But it would cost them always about $10 000.- to make themselves a single BTC.  This would more or less peg the value of a bitcoin to more or less $10 000.-

It would make the system even more permissionless, it wouldn't give all the power in the hands of a few miners, there wouldn't be any seigniorage (all coins you make, cost you about what they are worth, and there's no hope for value increase).  The system would be much more decentralized.  There wouldn't be any temptation for speculation.  It would be a currency, and nothing else ; and everybody could make some, but there would be no point in making any if the market price is below the $10 000.- a coin (so no coin production AT ALL) ; there would be a huge incentive to make more of it when the market price is higher than $10 000.- a coin.

I would also propose a "destruction fee" of, say, 0.5% of the amount transacted, but that is destroyed instead of won by the consensus miner.  As such, the global stash diminishes, in case there's no tendency for a coin to grow to $10 000.-
(note that there's no pegging to any $ value, but rather to a cost of mining, which is a real economic cost, and hence a genuine economic value).

Such a crypto would be a true currency and nothing else.

[dinofelis]

there is no harm too if bitcoin serve as an investment asset .

Ok, but just think about the forex market. Are the currencies you trade on forex markets considered digital assets or long-term investments?

The forex market is not the principal determinant of currencies' prices.  Even if a currency is almost not traded by speculators on forex markets, its value is determined by the economy you buy with it, independently of people speculating on it or not.  Forex are speculators, going with the tide of currencies, that have their market price determined mainly NOT by those speculators.  With crypto, it is the opposite.

If you speculate on the price of wood, but the wood market price is essentially determined by non-speculative offer and demand, then you can always do so, the wood price is a real utility price.  A currency also has a real utility price (given by Fisher's formula).  But if the price of an asset is mainly determined by demand and offer of those speculating on it, that totally changes the asset's nature, and it becomes a purely speculative asset then, of which the utility value is negligible.  That's the case with crypto.

[Lorilikes]

I'm writing this post because I see it everywhere on this forum. People who just talk about Bitcoin pump(s), $ price, € price and so on... even most legendary members do it!


I think most Bitcoin users miss what Bitcoin really is and what Satoshi wanted it to be.
If you read the white paper, there's no mention about Bitcoin as a digital asset. Satoshi just wanted to create a payment system, a strong one and much better than the traditional ones.

But right now, Bitcoin is mainly considered as a digital asset, digital gold, just an investment tool to make (quick) profit. That's wrong, in my opinion.

I think Bitcoin users are raping Satoshi's original view, thinking only about BTC's value on exchanges.


What most don't understand is that Satoshi gave us a huge power. The power to destroy and make disappear forever the whole old banking system, other online payment systems like paypal and maybe governments too. Forever.

He gave us the power to decentralize everything using the blockchain technology. In short, Satoshi gave us the power the change the world for the better.


So why are you focusing only on Bitcoin's price on exchanges?


Imagine this.

A world where you can send money anywhere and to anyone in the world, instantly and with low fees.
A world where you can buy anything using Bitcoin, from coffees to yatchs.
A world where you can get all the privacy you want.
A world without banks.
A world without old currencies, that only create inflation.
A world where you pay only the taxes you wanna pay and not what you are forced to pay.


I think Satoshi's original view was very revolutionary.
A decentralized payment system and a deflationary currency. A real digital cash.


But now, Bitcoin has becomed just a digital asset. Maybe a toy for rich people to get even richer.
What's so revolutionary about it? The world is already full of assets and investment tool...


In short, Bitcoin lost most of its revolutionary appeal.

I strongly suggest you to change your consideration about Bitcoin. Now it's time to choose, because what we - as a community - decide now will influence all the future history of Bitcoin.


So, what do you prefer? A brick of gold or a better world?

we are still at the stage we want the world to LIKE US as the new kid in town...the price of BTC gives us hope that maybe what you state above can happen

but we are a little bit skittish yet...I assume if bitcoin hits 10k and has more use ..things will go as you state...as of now we are in the WTH stage of awe

and BTC price going up ...is a reflection of adoption and holding.....thus security at least for those of us holding bitcoin  

I admire the fierce tone of the original poster, and I have to give you a *high five for your vigorous presentation of the topic.  I LOVED the reply (quoted above) describing our state of collective awe. 
I am still laughing at this candid and playful truth.  We really are still baffled by the beauty of the sparkling Bitcoin phenomenon.  We all are.   Even the guys who are cluttering the internet with sales pitches that push gimmicky viewpoints like  the original poster is protesting.  The exploitation of anything profitable is guaranteed, no matter what the product. 
In the USA, regarding use of Bitcoin; much like real estate, it can be paper trailed as an asset to manipulate tax consequences.
In the USA An individual has the option to deem its btc an asset,  thanks to "Uncle Sam" and his gold-lined-pockets. Uncle Sam, aka the government likes its gold-pocket-lining and wishes to control the lining of as many pockets as possible to continue oppressing the sheep (aka the people). At least that is how it feels here in the USA. 

I am not endorsing the actions of any individual or entity, nor am I passing judgement, I am just trying to see through eyes of the people who are actively "pooping on the Bitcoin party". I want to see from their perspective so I can get a better look at the motivation ahead of the mishaps.  Problems are definitely coming if the conspiracy is in motion. 
I have no doubt in the strength and the continuity of beloved Bitcoin even if there are sinister forces trying to resist it. 

Bitcoin needs no defender.   The manipulative actions of Reuters, MSN, Big Banks, JPmorgan and all of the clowns selling btc as a product, are either scared of Bitcoin or they are profiting as wolves while tending their sheep. 
The gimmicky clowns are not guilty of much... because they are trained without their own consent by the media such as MSN. 

I should probably lock my front door now.

For the written record I am a big fan of Bill Gates however- his companies undermine the  power and freedom that Bitcoin offers. I see it daily in headlines by MSN even though Gates is often quoted saying how fond he is of Bitcoin. 
As interesting as it all is, I am confident that Bitcoin will NOT soon fail.
I predict Bitcoin to be favored by all these scared wealthy groups.  Soon. 

[Boseda]

The forex market is not the principal determinant of currencies' prices.  Even if a currency is almost not traded by speculators on forex markets, its value is determined by the economy you buy with it, independently of people speculating on it or not.  Forex are speculators, going with the tide of currencies, that have their market price determined mainly NOT by those speculators.  With crypto, it is the opposite.

That's exactly the problem. Only speculation and no economy.

[RodeoX]

I agree with your basic premise, but there is also the idea that we are not going to tell each other what to do with our money. That is the hard part about freedom. Freedom is not when you get to do what you want. It is when you are willing to allow others to do what you don't want them to do.

Yes, your opinion about freedom is true.

But I think you didn't understand my OP very well.
I didn't say people cannot use Bitcoin for whatever they want... it's their money and in my opinion they are free to use it how they prefer, even in ways I don't like (for example buying drugs, etc.)

Yet the fact is that most people consider Bitcoin not a payment system, but rather a digital asset.
This is the point. There's a sort of misconception about Bitcoin, in my opinion...

rodeox its not about telling people what they can do or not do with their money... its about waking people up to the fact that while some people are only looking at the price.. devs are screwing with the code and reducing what people can do with their money.

im sure you will see this when you visit africa and realise that trying to convince africans to use bitcoin is alot harder than trying to convince the icelandics

Now that I get it better I guess we are all on the same page. I would love to see retail adoption rather than a speculative economy. IMO, that is where bitcoin's strengths are. And as you both mention, economic liberty is a non-negotiable feature. 

[Last of the V8s]

I agree with your basic premise, but there is also the idea that we are not going to tell each other what to do with our money. That is the hard part about freedom. Freedom is not when you get to do what you want. It is when you are willing to allow others to do what you don't want them to do.

Yes, your opinion about freedom is true.

But I think you didn't understand my OP very well.
I didn't say people cannot use Bitcoin for whatever they want... it's their money and in my opinion they are free to use it how they prefer, even in ways I don't like (for example buying drugs, etc.)

Yet the fact is that most people consider Bitcoin not a payment system, but rather a digital asset.
This is the point. There's a sort of misconception about Bitcoin, in my opinion...

rodeox its not about telling people what they can do or not do with their money... its about waking people up to the fact that while some people are only looking at the price.. devs are screwing with the code and reducing what people can do with their money.

im sure you will see this when you visit africa and realise that trying to convince africans to use bitcoin is alot harder than trying to convince the icelandics

Now that I get it better I guess we are all on the same page. I would love to see retail adoption rather than a speculative economy. IMO, that is where bitcoin's strengths are. And as you both mention, economic liberty is a non-negotiable feature. 

I'm lost now. Did you mean to log in as this Boseda?

[GXHPP]

it's not just about the price, it's about the use and adoption as well, and using the currency as it should be used, as a method to send and receive payments and That's my opinion as well, but we have to accept there are people investing in BTC like that, it is their free choice and option to use their money and BTC. We can't just tell them to not do that.

[Lorilikes]

it's not just about the price, it's about the use and adoption as well, and using the currency as it should be used, as a method to send and receive payments and That's my opinion as well, but we have to accept there are people investing in BTC like that, it is their free choice and option to use their money and BTC. We can't just tell them to not do that.

The real paradox, if we are free to choose and free to speak than I suppose it is our freedom to listen or tune it out. 

Bitcoin will survive all of the various challenges regardless.  We will all be richer for it!

= )

[stompix]

Imagine this.

• A world where you can send money anywhere and to anyone in the world, instantly and with low fees.
  A world where you can buy anything using Bitcoin, from coffees to yatchs.
  A world where you can get all the privacy you want.
  A world without banks.
  A world without old currencies, that only create inflation.
  A world where you pay only the taxes you wanna pay and not what you are forced to pay.
  

• Somebody has to pay for that or for the security of the network. Hence it won't happen.
  Yeah, you can pretty much buy everything right now. The problem is that you can buy yachts in a country and airline tickets in other
  Not going to happen.
  Not going to happen.
  I doubt it will happen in my nepheews lifetime.
  Lols, keep dreaming and tell that to the doctor when you wake up.