I talked to some people at college about bitcoin and they laughed at me.

[chufchuf]

Bunches of torrent indexers have bitcoin as their prime way for donation- bitsnoop, kickass, thepiratebay you name it, they have it. Colleges can't compete as they are prisoners of the poverties of the tangible carnal body.

[mel2000]

Finally I said, "Well just if you spend about $1000 and buy about 5 coins they might be worth $100,000 someday."  She said it sounded like a good idea then.   Of course I tempered that with the fact that it was still a high risk investment but that there was potential for great rewards if it takes off like many of us think it will.

That's very unethical advice for a friend since you can't guarantee what you told her.

[BitChick]

Finally I said, "Well just if you spend about $1000 and buy about 5 coins they might be worth $100,000 someday."  She said it sounded like a good idea then.  Of course I tempered that with the fact that it was still a high risk investment but that there was potential for great rewards if it takes off like many of us think it will.

That's very unethical advice for a friend since you can't guarantee what you told her.

"Might be" and "high risk" are the words I used.  I also told her she could lose it all.  What is unethical then?

I think it would be more "unethical" not to tell her what the potential was.  She would come over to my new house and I would say, "Oh.  I forgot to tell you but there was this investment opportunity a few years back?"  That would probably be worse.

Also, this same friend has played the stock market and made and lost several thousand. She said "what is a grand?"  She did not seem to think it was a big deal to risk that much.  She has risked way more.  She also has far more money in the bank then I do so she would not even miss that small of an investment.  

I guess the "unethical" part is telling her about the potential for gains?  I think many people think $20,000 per BTC is not that far fetched.  If she purchased 5 they could very well be worth that at some point if she held them.  I really do believe that so I am not trying to misguide her.  

[sidhujag]

hey I follow the philosophy by Arthur Shcopenhaur

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

Any major innovation passes thru these stages. The fact that it is being ridiculed mesns we are still early adopters so we should be buying all the alts and bitcoin with both hands.. The price will rise the most within the first 10 years after that it may range or rise slower.  So we have until 2019 to reach the stage where it becomes voilently opposed and being self evident which may come fast...

At work I get opposed but ppl know Im not dumb so they dont day anything to me maybe they think lower of me but hey im ok with that. One guy an ex msft emplyee was interested in april when i told him it hit $266 and he said let me know when it hits $100 so i can buy.. so I did te next day lol and he said its too hard to buy.. which is true. It took me a month to get setup with bitcoins by buying via fiat...

as soon as atm comes out or it gets easier to buy wr may see another explosion in popularity.. until then we are early adopters personaly im buying alt coins because bitcoin will be parked in alts going forward as fiat seems to be phase out slowly and trust in the protocol grows.

[doof]

I used to write software for a bank.  Bunch of silvertops who cant even get an iPhone app to market, but get hard over 5%pa.  I pitched bitcoin when it was $5.

I got all the same reply's "its not backed by anything", "its a Ponzi scheme"

When it hit $200 I made sure they knew about how I made 40x my money... and asked them how their 5% "high interest" savings accounts are going. 

[Kazimir]

When introducing Bitcoin to newcomers, you shouldn't go into mining whatsoever. Mining is not what Bitcoin is all about. It only gives new people the wrong impression that Bitcoin is some scheme to "make money out of thin air". Especially if they get the notion that by letting their PC doing calculations over night, they magically get paid for it or something.

I always explain it in terms of currency (like euros and dollars) but independent of a state, bank, government, company, or other authority. Only until people get a basic notion and start wondering where new bitcoins come from, I bring up mining as a technical detail. Of course, mining is important within the concept of Bitcoin, but not for every day use. People need not to know or do anything with mining to buy, have, use, store, spend, or sell bitcoins whatsoever.

[niniyo]

I've gotten a mixed range of reactions from people:

"It's flawed economically.. you need inflation to encourage spending"

"It's nerd money that isn't very useful right now"

"I heard you can make free money?  Can you show me how to do it?"

"Is that illegal?  I heard you can buy drugs with it"

"It's already taken off.. I getting into litecoin because it's still small"

"Be careful.. how do you know it's not a scam?"

"I'm not convinced because there's not enough places to spend them"

Out of all the people I've talked to, no one has really understood the significance of what bitcoin is.  They see it as this novel little project.  They don't understand how relevant sound money is in our current global macroeconomic environment.  Nor do they see that bitcoin technology is a massive breakthrough and is kind of like opening pandoras box.  It's just not going to go away and it's here to change the world in a big way.

To be honest I think it's really going to be the people in the developing countries (eg. Argentina, India, Brazil, etc...), the ones facing collapsing currencies, capitol controls, bank holidays, and bail-ins/bail-outs.  They will be the people who see the real problems in front of their own eyes, and their wealth dissapearing day by day.  They will understand that they need to take action to protect their wealth.  The ignorant first world people will happily continue working for the status-quo fiat system, distracted by their tv and junk food, until one day they wake up and realise how poor they are.

We can try to convince people through logical arguments, but I think in the end bitcoin will attract newcomers out of necessity, and they will probably be from the countries who are suffering the most.

[FeedbackLoop]

I've gotten a mixed range of reactions from people:

"It's flawed economically.. you need inflation to encourage spending"

"It's nerd money that isn't very useful right now"

"I heard you can make free money?  Can you show me how to do it?"

"Is that illegal?  I heard you can buy drugs with it"

"It's already taken off.. I getting into litecoin because it's still small"

"Be careful.. how do you know it's not a scam?"

"I'm not convinced because there's not enough places to spend them"

Out of all the people I've talked to, no one has really understood the significance of what bitcoin is.  They see it as this novel little project.  They don't understand how relevant sound money is in our current global macroeconomic environment.  Nor do they see that bitcoin technology is a massive breakthrough and is kind of like opening pandoras box.  It's just not going to go away and it's here to change the world in a big way.

To be honest I think it's really going to be the people in the developing countries (eg. Argentina, India, Brazil, etc...), the ones facing collapsing currencies, capitol controls, bank holidays, and bail-ins/bail-outs.  They will be the people who see the real problems in front of their own eyes, and their wealth dissapearing day by day.  They will understand that they need to take action to protect their wealth.  The ignorant first world people will happily continue working for the status-quo fiat system, distracted by their tv and junk food, until one day they wake up and realise how poor they are.

We can try to convince people through logical arguments, but I think in the end bitcoin will attract newcomers out of necessity, and they will probably be from the countries who are suffering the most.

Perhaps what people need is to first learn the monetary system they currently use. Then it becomes easy to see why Bitcoin is so awesome. Or perhaps "people" are just hopeless...

[darkmule]

I've gotten a mixed range of reactions from people:

"It's flawed economically.. you need inflation to encourage spending"

That's actually an argument made by people who understand money, to some degree, but don't understand Bitcoin.  It actually has a good deal of truth with relation to government-backed currencies, but the fact that Bitcoin does not have this characteristic is a feature, not a bug, and was designed into it entirely intentionally.

It's also an irrelevant criticism of cryptocurrencies in general, because if a critical mass of people did consider it a problem, it's just as possible to design a cryptocurrency that did have inflation.  So far, nobody has wanted one enough to make one catch on (I'm not counting Freicoin).

[CurbsideProphet]

Most people don't have a level of intelligence to understand bitcoin.  It is counter-intuitive to non-smart people.

If that's true, Bitcoin is destined to fail.  Luckily I don't believe that.

[wachtwoord]

Most people don't have a level of intelligence to understand bitcoin.  It is counter-intuitive to non-smart people.

It's something I would put in my "what do you love most" list. Natural selection is awesome

[Pumpkin]

Most people don't understand bitcoin and therefore don't trust it. Thus they don't want to use it for now.

That being said, people don't understand how fiat currencies work. They still use them.

When fiat currencies start stealing 10%-20% per year from everyone's savings, people will suddenly learn about bitcoin and understand it enough to trust it The more people leave fiat currencies, the more needs to be stolen from the rest bag holders holding fiat.

[justusranvier]

"some people laughed at me"

I didn't know that psychotherapy belonged in the Bitcoin Discussion forum?

[btcusr]

There are many wrong predictions.

1. Cars - who wants to drive a car with combustible fuel that could explode anytime
2. Photocopier - we already have carbon papers

And, many more.

[ANiceJewishBoy]

That is weird, I never noticed that... Why is it butterfly labs? Why isn't there a company like "Block Crusher" or something making ASICs?

[Golph]

We were talking about the twitter IPO, and one of the guys had invested in facebook when it launched, inside I laughed at him, but to maybe help them expand their horizons I brought up bitcoin, and told them about all of the money I have made, the ups and downs, its utility, how bitcoins are created etc etc... they started going online and looking up asics and shouting the names like they coulnd't take them seriously because of their names. I don't mine though, and I told them right now isn't the greatest time to invest in those. Then they started talking about buying a bunch of cheap computers off ebay, I'm pretty sure I explained the difficulty and the computing power needed. At least one of the guys was like, I'm gonna see this guy one day as a billionaire. The other guy not so much. I still can't tell if they were pulling my chain, maybe I'm too sensitive, but it sure felt like it... I guess I'll be the one laughing to the bank.

Thats normal, mine is worse. My friend say its scam say I am dumb and calling me names...

[BitchicksHusband]

I told a very smart programmer (because he walked in on a conversation between 2 of us bitcoiners) and he just dismissed it as a Ponzi scheme.  I told him to look into it but I don't know whether he will.

Maybe when I retire in a year and a half at 45 I'll tell him why...

[b!z]

I told a very smart programmer (because he walked in on a conversation between 2 of us bitcoiners) and he just dismissed it as a Ponzi scheme.  I told him to look into it but I don't know whether he will.

Maybe when I retire in a year and a half at 45 I'll tell him why...

The price of Bitcoin will not reach $1000, or $100,000 in a year and a half.

[malevolent]

The price of Bitcoin will not reach $1000, or $100,000 in a year and a half.

Maybe he already bought enough BTC when it was in the single digits?

[wachtwoord]

Most people don't understand bitcoin and therefore don't trust it. Thus they don't want to use it for now.

That being said, people don't understand how fiat currencies work. They still use them.

When fiat currencies start stealing 10%-20% per year from everyone's savings, people will suddenly learn about bitcoin and understand it enough to trust it The more people leave fiat currencies, the more needs to be stolen from the rest bag holders holding fiat.

Haha, but people think they know how fiat currencies work. You won't believe how many people I had to correct and tell that the Euro is not backed by gold. Then they usually say: but the dutch Guilder was right? I can tell them no, the dutch Guilder didn't even float freely as it was pegged to the German D Mark which wasn't backed by gold either. Before Nixon dropped the gold standard and the Guilder was pegged to the USD it was sort of indirectly backed by gold, but that's a long time ago.

Some people don't even know they can print more. They assume they print to replace old money, not create more. Usually the next thing they say is: Hey! that's not really fair is it?