Amazon accepting Bitcoin - What can go wrong?

[Kprawn]

I see a lot of people pushing for companies like Amazon to accept Bitcoin as a payment option. Have we considered the

implications of these decisions? Let's say we cannot scale to "service" the need for millions of new people who would use

this technology for the first time. What a big embarrassment would it be, if people waited 13 hours for their transactions to

be confirmed. Doing this now will hurt Bitcoin more than any other "bad" thing that has happened to it before.

We need to wait for the perfect scaling solution to address this problem, before Amazon or any other big retailer starts to

accept Bitcoin as a payment option. The Lightning Network might get us close, but it is not a proven technology yet.

Let's hear your thoughts on this? 

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[iv4n]

I follow what is happening with Amazon, and today's news are throwing new light on this situation. https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/amazon-subsidiary-registers-ethereum-cryptocurrency-domains/?utm_content=bufferc7af1&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
I don't understand fully what is happening here, I will copy one sentence from article "large organizations regularly register domain names to protect their brand, and that as such the move, by itself, isn’t enough to jump to any conclusions". What will happen and why they opened this domains is not clear, do they have any plans or they are just protect their brand we will see.

[mrcash02]

If we wait for the perfect solution it will take too much time. For now the solutions are palliative, but work for sometime anyway. People who deal with Bitcoins know its currently limitations, people are aware about it and if they still want to use the digital currency, go on...

[liuqi]

If we wait for the perfect solution it will take too much time. For now the solutions are palliative, but work for sometime anyway. People who deal with Bitcoins know its currently limitations, people are aware about it and if they still want to use the digital currency, go on...

With the way of purse.io still amazon purchases is possible with the bitcoin. There is many options available in online to use the bitcoin to recharge mobiles, air tickets and purse provides the payment options. Last month announcement from the Amazon team that making bitcoin to use in their site. Will take more opportunities to the re-sellers who doing selling for amazon.

[Hydrogen]

I think a high percentage of amazon customers opt for the free shipping option which can take 2+ weeks. Waiting for bitcoin to confirm, on top of a 2 week shipping time may not be that much of an inconvenience.

The "scaling problem" could be a good problem to have. One way of viewing it is: "bitcoin can't be used to buy a cup of coffee and isn't ready for a prime time, mainstream, role". The flipside of that might say that if bitcoin's network lacks the transactional volume to cover all transactions, retailers might expand their platform to include support for other crypto to fill the vacuum. One perspective is likely over-optimistic while the other is the opposite. The likely outcome could be somewhere inbetween the two.

Bitpay green lights transactions on the 1st confirmation which isn't too bad.

Amazon accepting bitcoin would be similar to an official endorsement. If the public sees amazon endorsing bitcoin while banker CEO's condemn bitcoin it will create a divide, a conflict of mainstream opinion as opposed to the typical unified front the media is often able to maintain. That could encourage the public to research and learn about crypto more rather than believe the mainstream media angle of it being a bubble, which could be a good thing even if transactions aren't instantaneous.

[cioloxl]

I think a high percentage of amazon customers opt for the free shipping option which can take 2+ weeks. Waiting for bitcoin to confirm, on top of a 2 week shipping time may not be that much of an inconvenience.

The "scaling problem" could be a good problem to have. One way of viewing it is: "bitcoin can't be used to buy a cup of coffee and isn't ready for a prime time, mainstream, role". The flipside of that might say that if bitcoin's network lacks the transactional volume to cover all transactions, retailers might expand their platform to include support for other crypto to fill the vacuum. One perspective is likely over-optimistic while the other is the opposite. The likely outcome could be somewhere inbetween the two.

Bitpay green lights transactions on the 1st confirmation which isn't too bad.

Amazon accepting bitcoin would be similar to an official endorsement. If the public sees amazon endorsing bitcoin while banker CEO's condemn bitcoin it will create a divide, a conflict of mainstream opinion as opposed to the typical unified front the media is often able to maintain. That could encourage the public to research and learn about crypto more rather than believe the mainstream media angle of it being a bubble, which could be a good thing even if transactions aren't instantaneous.

Let's say we skip wait-times altogether. Say nobody gives a shit (a lot of people do, though). What about the fees? The astronomical fees from say, 200k utxo in mempool? I think it could hurt bitcoin more than it would help which gets me ranting about Core's incompetence.

[dunfida]

I see a lot of people pushing for companies like Amazon to accept Bitcoin as a payment option. Have we considered the

implications of these decisions? Let's say we cannot scale to "service" the need for millions of new people who would use

this technology for the first time. What a big embarrassment would it be, if people waited 13 hours for their transactions to

be confirmed. Doing this now will hurt Bitcoin more than any other "bad" thing that has happened to it before.

We need to wait for the perfect scaling solution to address this problem, before Amazon or any other big retailer starts to

accept Bitcoin as a payment option. The Lightning Network might get us close, but it is not a proven technology yet.

Let's hear your thoughts on this? 

I wont see any problems regarding on this matter if they would add up bitcoin on their payment options. We do know that once bitcoin has being transferred it cant be reverted which this thing would really matter if Amazon management would consider this thing.Once payment is already reflected then normal transactions would be done after that.If they cant comprehend those kind of situations then for sure they wont really accept it and would rather stay on the traditional ways since they are already here for how many years using that payment options.

[genology]

Using Bitcoin in online transactions can make it more efficient and safe. A person can make transactions anywhere and he/she is sure that the payment will be received. So for me, Bitcoin in Amazon is a great thing to push through. It can make things easier for both the Amazon and their customers. As you can see, everything is going digital nowadays and we should accept change especially if it is for a better cause.

[TheCoinFinder]

Bitcoin being accepted by major online retailers like amazon, ebay and more others is making sense of happiness among shoppers.
People would not need to wait for hours, mostly the retailers that accept bitcoin do confirm payment as soon as first confirmation of transaction takes place.
Retailers will not go through bitcoin payment system until they have a perfect scaling solution for their clients payments.

[iqlimasyadiqa]

Bitcoin being accepted by major online retailers like amazon, ebay and more others is making sense of happiness among shoppers.
People would not need to wait for hours, mostly the retailers that accept bitcoin do confirm payment as soon as first confirmation of transaction takes place.
Retailers will not go through bitcoin payment system until they have a perfect scaling solution for their clients payments.

If all that can happen then Bitcoin will be better than now. Great e-commerce will make bitcoin better known and its use will be wider. Systematically this can make an increase in Bitcoin prices. I saved some Bitcoin at the moment and I started to exchange local currency to Bitcoin for use in purchasing goods online. I am now regularly buying cellular credit and paying electricity bills using Bitcoin. and if amazon and ebay can accept Bitcoin then it could be 50% financial system many people will be controlled by Bitcoin.

[Nameless27]

The more I look at it and more news coming out about it, only good things I can react on this matter. Amazon is a big company that can only boost more bitcoin popularity to its client. This is something I’m looking forward to experienced. This year is the best of all, when it comes to cryptocurrency history.

What can we expect more about bitcoin + amazon now? when the price is at 7400$ is it a big jump if indeed will happen this year or maybe an early next year. I don’t see but thinks on this news.

[Aamir1]

I don't think it will do any bad for bitcoin at all. We all know that there are obviously millions of people using Amazon right now, and yes, many of them, or maybe most of them does not even know about bitcoin and it would be their first time to see it or use it if they want, but i don't think they will consider it a bad choice if they understand the whole concept of it rather than just looking at the time a transaction takes or the high fees right now. They would surely use bitcoin instead of any other payment option because i don't think if a person needs something urgently they would use online shopping for it, and if it is nothing about being early, why bother about the confirmation of your payment? Let it take its time and wait for your product to get shipped to you.

[AT101ET]

Not sure how this will directly affect BTC but I’m curious as to how amazon would go about this scenario.
Say someone buys an item when BTC is $5000/BTC. They then decide to return the item a few days later by which point the price changes significantly (up or down). How would amazon go about it? If they refund you in BTC they could potentially lose a lot of money on the refund if the price of BTC goes up, assuming that they exchange the BTC for FIAT given the fact that they need to forward payments to sellers and the like...

[djaliel]

I think bitcoin is not effective for payment methods, more likely to be effective for investments like gold, because the price is very expensive,
or there is a store like amazon for payment method with minimum price to buy valuable goods, and no method of payment on goods that are cheap

[madentopere]

I see a lot of people pushing for companies like Amazon to accept Bitcoin as a payment option. Have we considered the

implications of these decisions? Let's say we cannot scale to "service" the need for millions of new people who would use

this technology for the first time. What a big embarrassment would it be, if people waited 13 hours for their transactions to

be confirmed. Doing this now will hurt Bitcoin more than any other "bad" thing that has happened to it before.

We need to wait for the perfect scaling solution to address this problem, before Amazon or any other big retailer starts to

accept Bitcoin as a payment option. The Lightning Network might get us close, but it is not a proven technology yet.

Let's hear your thoughts on this? 

if amazon accept bitcoin price may increase more than 3,000$ less than 1 day

[n0ne]

I'm not sure whether my thinking is right or wrong, but from my view such an acceptance from Amazon will truly take bitcoin reach next levels of growth in terms of acceptance, usage from people as well market circulation. Same time there are possibilities of dropping the same service, because several companies have initiated plans of accepting bitcoin and stopped it once they felt its not used much by the people as expected.

[1Referee]

I think bitcoin is not effective for payment methods, more likely to be effective for investments like gold, because the price is very expensive,
or there is a store like amazon for payment method with minimum price to buy valuable goods, and no method of payment on goods that are cheap

That can easily be 'solved' with off-chain implementations like Lightning Network, which would allow an insane number of transactions to be pumped through per second, and that potentially at ultra low cost. It will allow people to conduct micro transactions (which will significantly spark adoption in third world countries), and thus also purchase things that are priced at sub $1 levels without any problems. In that regard, it would suit you to adjust your stance on Bitcoin as currency. Currently I do admit that the fees as per their fiat value look high, but that's because the price has gone up significantly, and partly because Segwit (still) isn't being put into practice as much as I would like it to be.

[Hydrogen]

Let's say we skip wait-times altogether. Say nobody gives a shit (a lot of people do, though). What about the fees? The astronomical fees from say, 200k utxo in mempool? I think it could hurt bitcoin more than it would help which gets me ranting about Core's incompetence.

Fees are a controversial topic. One school of thought says: core developers are to blame. The opposing school of thought says: miners are creating a crisis to justify getting rid of core devs, to centralize the development and mining paradigms of btc under their own domain.

Awhile ago, I posted an article containing evidence to support the latter argument, in this thread:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2277787.0

The case for bigger blocks is open for debate. Its very possible there are hidden political agendas behind the call for increases in block size. Rather than legitimate technical or engineering based need for it.

If you follow software engineers on twitter or social media. Its always interesting to see them weigh in and comment on the debate. They don't necessarily support segwit2x or bigger blocks like some might expect them to.

[Sadlife]

This are all rumors still no official announcement about it in amazon i think the transaction time is just fine where you have to wait 10-20 minutes for the transaction to get confirmed also some big company namely CME group have accepted bitcoin so this might convince anazon to also invest in it. Amazon is advertising bitcoin and have been jumping to conclusions we should just wait on what move they're goin to make.

[Zandar]

If anyone has BTC but has no idea about the confirmations when using it, that would be like buying a mobile phone without any knowledge of how to use it. Also when a person buys BTC that person must have created a BTC wallet in order to receive the bought BTC. And after purchasing BTC that same person will see that it needs confirmation etc before it becomes available for spending, the wallet will show that. But if a person decides to let all of this done by another person due to laziness, then that person deserves the anguish when trying to spend it as a reward for their own stupidity.