I am NOT 100% Convinced Bitcoin Is Money...

[Biomech]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/afontevecchia/2011/07/13/bernanke-fights-ron-paul-in-congress-golds-not-money/

Bernanke Fights Ron Paul In Congress: Gold Isn't Money

Bernanke says it is not money so it is not money 

Bernanke says that inflation is less than 2%. Yet the cost of my staple foods have nearly doubled in two years. As I live on the edge of homelessness at all times, that level of inaccuracy is NOT useful in any way. Besides, Bernanke is a weak kneed toad. If the Fed is to regain any credibility they need another Volker, or at least a Greenspan. If you are going to play crazy games with the economy, you should be an INTELLIGENT traitor. Not just an academic follower.

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[Operatr]

Fiat money is just metal and linen with no intrinsic value on their own. It is only worth something because we say it is worth something. Fiat might as well be seashells or leaves, as Bernake and his international banker cronies can just keep making more endlessly.

I'm not 100% convinced the Dollar is money.

[Biomech]

Fiat money is just metal and linen with no intrinsic value on their own. It is only worth something because we say it is worth something. Fiat might as well be seashells or leaves, as Bernake and his international banker cronies can just keep making more endlessly.

I'm not 100% convinced the Dollar is money.

I would argue further that it's counterfeit, as it's initial run was supposed to be backed in gold (read the earlier "legal tender" clauses) and then, by using the frog boiling method, it was stripped of all backing.

[Guardian of Forever]

How bitcoin is valued will be market based. If you live in the USA, its going to be valued in dollars. If you are using bitcoin in the jungles of South America, it may be valued in coconuts. There will always be a need for some kind of exchange. Weather that is a currency exchange or a commodity exchange does not matter. Ultimately the user will have to be able to use bitcoin as easily as they are using their own countries currency. Businesses will also have to easily exchange bitcoin for what ever medium their suppliers use. It would be nice if everyone would accept bitcoin, and forgo any exchange. Exchanges are an inefficient way to move money. But until I can call up my supplier in China, and do business in bitcoin, I will have to use something that is acceptable for all parties.

Large companies use to have their own banking system, called the payroll department. With large sums of currency, or gold/silver. This is going to be needed again, as bitcoins need to work outside of the current central banking system. Companies will have to be able to maintain a store of bitcoin for this to work.

[Lorren]

You're right, Bitcoin is not money. It's more than money! A dollar bill can't send itself. But bitcoin can!

Reminds me of my six year old, who said that he wanted to invent a system that involved taking a picture of you holding money "to prove that you had it" in order to buy something.  He was upset because he wanted to buy a game but didn't have a credit card.  We later had to get him to think about why his invention wouldn't quite work the way that he thought it would.  He wouldn't need his invention with BTC though.

[Operatr]

You're right, Bitcoin is not money. It's more than money! A dollar bill can't send itself. But bitcoin can!

Reminds me of my six year old, who said that he wanted to invent a system that involved taking a picture of you holding money "to prove that you had it" in order to buy something.  He was upset because he wanted to buy a game but didn't have a credit card.  We later had to get him to think about why his invention wouldn't quite work the way that he thought it would.  He wouldn't need his invention with BTC though.

Sounds like Bitcoin could be a valuable teaching tool there  

This is the true power of BTC as a currency. As system where all of the money must be made accountable. If a loan is made in BTC, it is made with actual currency and not air. It is still the transfer of wealth from one person to another, just like loaning out some amount of physical gold or loaning cash to a friend to be paid back.

A "loan" now is just the creation of more debt overall and is based on nothing as a future liability for the bank. Technically the bank didn't actually loan you anything at all but some run time on Bernake's Magic Money Machine.

If the world operated on a free market system that cannot be corrupted by endless printing of money, that means our government would have to be accountable for their spending because they can't just spend their way out of it (which never works obviously). It means that the rich and powerful only stay that way if society allows it. Imagine a government that only functions financially at the will of the public, since they can never tax us by force. If they want to go to war it would only happen through willful public spending. Their salaries are only as big as we allow them to be, as the menial government jobs they should be. Obviously there are some hypotheticals in there, but overall a BTC conversion would create accountability unseen at any point in US history, or world history for that matter.

[Biomech]

Operatr, you are an idealist. I know my tribe 

[Guardian of Forever]

Currently there is no bitcoin bank to speak of, so bitcoin loans are person to person, and can not be hypothacated. In other words if I have 2 BTC to loan, I can't make loans on 10BTC. This would be fraud unless you are a part of the central banks, then it is regular business. Can anybody say legalized theft...

Bitcoin as a store of value...Today yes I put a value to it. As for the future it is too early to tell. The central banks (and Governments) will try to kill it as bitcoin as a trade facilitator threatens their power, and gives that power to bitcoin users.

Currency, whether bitcoin, seashells, or cash, used as a medium of exchange, is Money.

[Operatr]

Operatr, you are an idealist. I know my tribe 

  I do believe in a better tomorrow, and pushing through the coming pain to get there for our combined futures. My generation is out of gas, it's time to step up and right this wrong after 100 years of money generated misery.

[Kazimir]

Bitcoin is digital gold. Is gold money? No. So bitcoin is not money.

Gold is not "money" in the usual meaning because it lacks certain essential and practical features. Bitcoins solves that (and more).

Otherwise you can also say: Dollars are bits on a bank's server. Are bits money? No. So Dollars are not money.

Anyway:

I don't know why people are talking about this still, Evoorhees nailed it.

This.

For all of you who missed this, here's Erik's excellent article once again: http://evoorhees.blogspot.com/2013/05/bitcoin-2013-role-of-bitcoin-as-money.html?m=1 ← Read this!

[Biomech]

Bitcoin is digital gold. Is gold money? No. So bitcoin is not money.

Gold is not "money" in the usual meaning because it lacks certain essential and practical features. Bitcoins solves that (and more).

Otherwise you can also say: Dollars are bits on a bank's server. Are bits money? No. So Dollars are not money.

Anyway:

I don't know why people are talking about this still, Evoorhees nailed it.

This.

For all of you who missed this, here's Erik's excellent article once again: http://evoorhees.blogspot.com/2013/05/bitcoin-2013-role-of-bitcoin-as-money.html?m=1 ← Read this!

I have to take issue with this. The 'standard' definition of money has been Aristotle's for more generations than the very concept of fiat.  To whit

Within such frame work, Aristotle defined the characteristics of a good form of money:

1.) It must be durable. Money must stand the test of time and the elements. It must not fade, corrode, or change through time.

2.) It must be portable. Money hold a high amount of 'worth' relative to its weight and size.

3.) It must be divisible. Money should be relatively easy to separate and re-combine without affecting its fundamental characteristics. An extension of this idea is that the item should be 'fungible'. Dictionary.com describes fungible as:

"(esp. of goods) being of such nature or kind as to be freely exchangeable or replaceable, in whole or in part, for another of like nature or kind."

4.) It must have intrinsic value. This value of money should be independent of any other object and contained in the money itself.

Gold meets all of that. Little else does, bit coin included. It misses on part 4, as despite its decentralized nature, it IS a fiat currency. A novel approach, but still...

[Operatr]

Or perhaps, Bitcoin is not compatible to gold, or fiat, because Bitcoin is a new class of its own. Really it isn't as it does not work in any way like the currencies preceded it beyond the analogs of physical gold mining built into it and the ability to spend it for goods and services as a bartering medium.

Barter>Metal>Fiat>Crypto

[Biomech]

Or perhaps, Bitcoin is not compatible to gold, or fiat, because Bitcoin is a new class of its own. Really it isn't as it does not work in any way like the currencies preceded it beyond the analogs of physical gold mining built into it and the ability to spend it for goods and services as a bartering medium.

Barter>Metal>Fiat>Crypto

I am willing to entertain that idea. It still parallels fiat more than gold.

[smoothie]

OP,

Everyone has a differing definition of MONEY.

Simply put: Your definition may not line up with others. So don't try so hard to understand. Just keep your definition and accept that others are different.