I believe the price of bitcoin will change, in the future. It will go down, and up, and down, and up, but not necessarily in that order, and the downs won't necessarily cancel out the ups (or vice versa.)
I "believe" in Bitcoin as a monumental technological innovation and a really cool way to fight the bankster cartel, just as much as the next person - in fact, probably more than the next person. However, I would be lying if I said part of the reason I was involved didn't have anything to do with my thousands of % of gains. Did I shatter your artificial dichotomy at all?
- I use Bitcoin mainly for purchases, mid-term savings, and "lite" speculation that is more like market-making with orders on either side that are frequently adjusted. I make very small gains but I do my small part to help keep the price stable. Of course, the deflationary aspect is nice because it makes me money, and if someone takes it (i.e. it goes down in value), it'll be a bunch of panic-selling bears and I'd rather them have it than whichever too-big-to-fail bank is being bailed out next. I don't have more invested than I can afford to lose.
-I use alt-coins mainly for speculation although Namecoin has a neat concept and I'm sure we'll be seeing some really cool use-cases for similar technologies in the years to come.
I actually agree with ElectricMucus here; except for short-term bear. I'm pretty darned neutral short-term. And super-long term bear is spot on - as great as Bitcoin is, there are too many innovative theories regarding currency (or lack thereof) in the future to assume that it will be used for the next century. Bitcoin is just our shortcut to get rid of the banksters, courtesy of Satoshi.
