How Paypal did it - Bitcoin should do the same - 10BTC Bounty for implementation

[Yankee (BitInstant)]

When Paypal first started, nobody had an account - therefore the value of the paypal "network" was practically worthless.

The stroke of genius that Paypal had to get rapid adoption of it's payment system was to allow people to "send money" to others without a Paypal account.

Thus, if that person wanted that money - they would sign up for that Paypal account. Obviously, rapid adoption of Paypal followed.

This functionality *needs* to be implemented into Bitcoin. The biggest problem I have heard from users is "how do I get BTC". It's an annoyingly slow, painful process - even for the tech savvy.

I see two ways of implementation - the first being a "Paypal" like intermediary - though they run the risk of becoming the Paypal of the BTC world (fees on top of fees, etc) - the second would be a simple open sourced web implementation that allowed people to easily send money to someone that wasn't already familiar with Bitcoin.

I imagine a website that allows you to enter someone's email address, they (the website opeator) in turn receive the payment and send an email to the user explaining how to claim their BTC. Once the user does this - they have now crossed the threshold of pain in getting started with BTC. I'm sure what worked for Paypal, would work just as well for BTC.

Personally, I would use this site to send money to my friends - and I would also begin to use it for transactions on Craigslist, etc. Right now the running joke in our office is that we will pay each other back in BTC. Why? Because it's just so flippin' hard to use.

This would be blindingly simple to implement - and quite honestly, I'm willing to pony up 10BTC to see this developed - who else is willing to pitch in?

WOW, you read our minds!

We are actually working on a similar project, currently in late development.

BitInstant.com will be providing instant transfers for the bitcoin economy.
BitInstant is a new service that allows you to quickly and easily transfer funds into your online exchange account without delay using Liberty Reserve or Paypal.

You can fund your exchange account instantly using this form. No complex signup or account is needed - just enter your details and the funds will be deposited into your account before you can even say "3-5 working days waiting period", it's even easier than ordering a pizza!

Thats all I can say for now, we'll keep you informed!

[phillipsjk]

Why wouldn't you just email someone a wallet? You could also email them a client or provide direction on how to download one. The nice thing about that is that if they don't ever spend the money, you can spend it yourself from the backup wallet you keep. They, OTOH, can transfer the money into a new wallet if they don't want you to have access to it. 

This would be an excellent present to family and friends for birthdays, Christmas, etc. Kind of like a store gift card. 

Sending a wallet via e-mail is a bad idea. You even explain why in your post, except you forget that your ISP, the recipient's ISP, and any government wiretappers can also spend the coins.

Bitbills are similar, but the secret is hidden until revealed. Unfortunately the average user can not redeem them at the moment.

[Sandoz]

Yeah, um, I'm TRYING to get something like that set up, where people can automatically send money to someone else, and the system automatically buys Bitcoin on an exchange and sells it to a different currency in a different country or something in the background, but there are a TON of legal and regulatory issues with even getting a bank account that could participate in this. And I don't have the $25,000,000 of my own backing to open my own bank  

That would be awesome!! Imagine integrating this with an e-commerce solution! It would allow to transparently handle four cases (dollar as an example)

1) Buyer wants to pay in BTC, Seller wants BTC.
2) Buyer wants to pay in USD, Seller wants BTC.
3) Buyer wants to pay in BTC, Seller wants USD.
4) Buyer wants to pay in USD, Seller wants USD.

It would give a huge boost to the BTC acceptance as anyone would be able to accept payments in BTC even if they don't care how they work...

Is something like this doable??

[Jack of Diamonds]

I think fast block chain setup is important too.

Nothing says impulse buy like a 2 hour delay before you can actually do anything .

How about only verifying small bits of the blockchain based on a random algorithm?
(For example, block 1450, block 86826, block 127691, block 34772 etc.. Then they get confirmed by anonymous peers on the BTC network to be valid, and the blocks change each time)
 
Might be much more feasible and faster than downloading hundreds of megabytes of data, and should be just as secure.

[miner249er]

I'd upload some Bitcoin to an Instawllet and send them the link.

As you say, that way you can reclaim it if they never take it. I don't like the idea of the recipient only having 14 days to claim bitcoinmail, but then, the service is free so they need to pay for hosting somehow.

The 14 day claim period is a huge stumbling block. The last thing I would want to have happen is not being able to get the funds back in the even that the person was somehow *not* able to claim the funds. Basically this puts the risk exposure to me somewhere around the $20 mark for using that service.

For example, I just made an auction purchase for $785, there is no way I would ever send that via a service that could claim the coins after 14 days if for some reason the recipient didn't receive the e-mail, etc.

The site (that I'm proposing) really needs to define itself as the payment escrow/caretaker for those that don't have the knowledge/resources to conduct the transaction directly with the current Bitcoin clients. Piggybacking on a current exchange/online wallet service that can ACH transfer funds directly to a bank account would obviously be of great use as well and rapidly spur adoption. Essentially it's all the familiarity of using a site like Paypal, except instead of $ it's BTC.

How you would monetize the service to pay for hosting, etc - I'm not 100% positive. However the startup cost for developing/hosting such a thing is so nominal these days that I would rather focus on something that services the community first, figures out how to build a business around it later.

Again - if someone is serious about attacking this - I'm happy to discuss in more detail.

[Chick]

I'm already working on this guys! 

[w1R903]

I'd upload some Bitcoin to an Instawllet and send them the link.

As you say, that way you can reclaim it if they never take it. I don't like the idea of the recipient only having 14 days to claim bitcoinmail, but then, the service is free so they need to pay for hosting somehow.

The 14 day claim period is a huge stumbling block. The last thing I would want to have happen is not being able to get the funds back in the even that the person was somehow *not* able to claim the funds.

Yeah, the 14-day claim period is not only a marketing disaster, it might also be illegal if this service is based in the US (depending on the state).  For example, in my state it's illegal to offer gift cards with any time of limited claim period.  The law is written in such a way that it applies to any goods or services that are purchased in advance can not "expire" after a certain waiting period.  Regardless, let's just say the FTC would frown upon this practice.

But it's all academic anyway since I think very few people would be willing to send money to a friend or family member if there's a risk that the service could claim the money after two weeks.  That is, unless they don't happen to read the "fine print", which I'm sure some people fail to do.

I agree that the service has to make money somehow, but why not implement a very small fee?  Better yet, one of the exchanges could do this in order to stir up new business.

[bitplane]

It would be better if they charged a small fee and sent the BTC back to a return address if it wasn't claimed

[TierNolan]

It would be better if they charged a small fee and sent the BTC back to a return address if it wasn't claimed

There are no return addresses for bitcoin transactions.

[jav]

Also relevant in this context: There already exists a project called PayBitBack ( http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=14707.0 ) which allows to send Bitcoins to anyone with a twitter account.

[Fiyasko]

I think fast block chain setup is important too.

Nothing says impulse buy like a 2 hour delay before you can actually do anything .

People have upload majority of the block chain. So download the file and stick it in. 2hrs becomes 20mins tops

[TierNolan]

People have upload majority of the block chain. So download the file and stick it in. 2hrs becomes 20mins tops

However, the client doesn't verify the chain if it is on the hard drive.

What they need is a -verify_chain command line option.  This would automatically happen the first time you start the client or if the date on the block chain file is updated.

[Maged]

People have upload majority of the block chain. So download the file and stick it in. 2hrs becomes 20mins tops

However, the client doesn't verify the chain if it is on the hard drive.

What they need is a -verify_chain command line option.  This would automatically happen the first time you start the client or if the date on the block chain file is updated.

That would still take a few hours. Yes, believe it or not, verifying the chain is the bottleneck.

[TiagoTiago]

How different is this from an exchange/online wallet service?

[Rassah]

Yeah, um, I'm TRYING to get something like that set up, where people can automatically send money to someone else, and the system automatically buys Bitcoin on an exchange and sells it to a different currency in a different country or something in the background, but there are a TON of legal and regulatory issues with even getting a bank account that could participate in this. And I don't have the $25,000,000 of my own backing to open my own bank  

That would be awesome!! Imagine integrating this with an e-commerce solution! It would allow to transparently handle four cases (dollar as an example)

1) Buyer wants to pay in BTC, Seller wants BTC.
2) Buyer wants to pay in USD, Seller wants BTC.
3) Buyer wants to pay in BTC, Seller wants USD.
4) Buyer wants to pay in USD, Seller wants USD.

It would give a huge boost to the BTC acceptance as anyone would be able to accept payments in BTC even if they don't care how they work...

Is something like this doable??

Actually, I was thinking of using this for international payments (Seller wants Indian Rupees, buyer wants to pay in USD), since  that is still rather expensive to do ($20 for a transfer or so). For buying within USD system, it's fairly cheap to buy using just USD with our current credit card system, and the fees involved with transferring money from BTC to USD, and then from the exchange account to the personal bank account, will likely not save you any money.

[FreeMoney]

Are you not counting instawallet for some reason? If you haven't looked, it puts coins in a link, you can give it to anyone and they can secure them by moving them to another instawallet or anywhere else.