New Bit-Pay Video! Alison and Ashly demonstrate Mobile Checkout

[nmat]

Firstbits definitely won't work. Another alternative is to use something like payb.tc

[cypherdoc]

Awesome!

Not the girls; BitPay!

edit:  you gotta stop torturing us like this 

[nmat]

Do you check for possible double-spend attempts or is the transaction accepted right away? What happens if a double spend occurs using a Finney attack (I know this is highly unlikely, but I want to know if you have considered the situation)?

[BitPay Business Solutions]

Do you check for possible double-spend attempts or is the transaction accepted right away?

We accept the payment right away, but alert the merchant immediately if it becomes invalid.  We haven't seen one yet, but for such small dollar amounts, we don't foresee it being an issue.  The merchant always has the choice to wait a little longer for more confirmations.

From what we can tell, merchants probably have a higher risk of getting a stolen credit card than getting a double-spend of a bitcoin.

[BubbleBoy]

As much as I like the 2girls1coin video, this product does not have a place in the market. PayPal barely scratched the surface of retail with millions of invested dollars. Credit cards are the IPv4 of retail, the industry workhorse that's always "just about" to be replaced.

[Bitcoin Swami]

As much as I like the 2girls1coin video, this product does not have a place in the market. PayPal barely scratched the surface of retail with millions of invested dollars. Credit cards are the IPv4 of retail, the industry workhorse that's always "just about" to be replaced.

I think its a little early to make that statement. 

[evoorhees]

As much as I like the 2girls1coin video, this product does not have a place in the market. PayPal barely scratched the surface of retail with millions of invested dollars. Credit cards are the IPv4 of retail, the industry workhorse that's always "just about" to be replaced.

It has a place in the market to the extent that people are using Bitcoins. If Bitcoin doesn't have a place in the market, then your statement is correct.

Your comparison with Paypal isn't quite valid. The Bitpay solution is more like a way for a bar to accept euros or yen, and will be in demand to the extent that euros or yen (or Bitcoins) are present in the economy.

And credit cards, as a medium (a plastic rectangle piece in your wallet) will be gone soon. See Google Wallet.

[jimbobway]

Some people like grandmas might be intimidated by the QR Code and camera concept.  Have you guys looked into http://bu.mp?

See this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=45315.0

[bitconformist]

So what is the advantage to using this over Visa/MC? No chargebacks?

Yep and you get geek/libertarian cred.

Geeks don't go to bars.
Libertarians don't go to bars with other people because they're goddamn insufferable.

Not a big market.

[BubbleBoy]

As much as I like the 2girls1coin video, this product does not have a place in the market. PayPal barely scratched the surface of retail with millions of invested dollars. Credit cards are the IPv4 of retail, the industry workhorse that's always "just about" to be replaced.

It has a place in the market to the extent that people are using Bitcoins. If Bitcoin doesn't have a place in the market, then your statement is correct.

Your comparison with Paypal isn't quite valid. The Bitpay solution is more like a way for a bar to accept euros or yen, and will be in demand to the extent that euros or yen (or Bitcoins) are present in the economy.

And credit cards, as a medium (a plastic rectangle piece in your wallet) will be gone soon. See Google Wallet.

The comparison with PayPal is entirely relevant: here we have a massive company with 100 million of active customers and 70 billion annual turnover. They could easily build a mobile application that enables the bar to accept euros or yens from the user's PayPal account. Such an application would be thousands of times more interesting to the bar than Bit-Pay mobile, since thousands times more people have non-zero PayPal accounts than bitcoin balances. Yet what does PayPal do ? They issue their own credit card - they want a piece of the credit card action ! That's because even for PayPal the network effect is too faint for retailers to bother implementing their system.

Online and e-commerce is where ecurrency works. If it succeeds there, maybe, just maybe there's a chance in the retail world, but this product does not have, at the moment, any place in the market.

As for credit cards going away, let's not get ahead of ourselves. The physical aspect changed from carbon copy to magstripe to chip and now to NFC. But the same old credit card cartel gets to steal 3% of your purchase, represented by MasterCard in the case of Google Wallet.

[BitPay Business Solutions]

Have you guys looked into http://bu.mp?

Yes we've looked at their API.  It's a neat concept, but it does not work as well as it should.  It's on our list to implement, but not a top priority.  We'd rather work on integrating with the restaurant POS.

Also - grandma's arthritis might not be good for bumping. 

[BitPay Business Solutions]

But the same old credit card cartel gets to steal 3% of your purchase, represented by MasterCard in the case of Google Wallet.

Bitcoin will do to the banking cartel what email did to the post office, and what internet did to newspapers, then travel agents, then media companies.  It will cannibalize their fees and profits and they either need to adapt or die.  It may not really take off for another year or two, but that's fine.  That gives us more time to write more software and fill out our product line.  And make more videos with the Bit-Pay Babes.

[jimbobway]

+1

But the same old credit card cartel gets to steal 3% of your purchase, represented by MasterCard in the case of Google Wallet.

Bitcoin will do to the banking cartel what email did to the post office, and what internet did to newspapers, then travel agents, then media companies.  It will cannibalize their fees and profits and they either need to adapt or die.  It may not really take off for another year or two, but that's fine.  That gives us more time to write more software and fill out our product line.  And make more videos with the Bit-Pay Babes.

[FreeMoney]

What is the current back up plan? Typing the whole address? Send a text and copy/paste?

Firstbits may not be useful where we need a unique address for every sale.  But I do like the idea.

The invoice that the business creates has the QR code, but the merchant can click the "Email" button at the top and email the instructions to the customer, or copy and paste the address into a text message to the customer.  So there are 2 backups if the customer cannot scan.

Take a look at the Invoice screenshot here:

https://bit-pay.com/aboutMobile.html

It's a little bit extra work, but it isn't expensive to prepare thousands or hundreds of thousands. Use SendMany to do a few thousand at a time sending 1 satoshi. Someone was even saying that you can prepare to have addresses with 0 output, but it hardly matters.

Maybe this is anti social behavior though since those get logged forever.

[btcbaby]

Congrats guys!

[Elwar]

This system is very easy to use.

It is implemented at my wife's boutique in Tarpon Springs, FL.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=44468.0

Hopefully I can get enough merchants interested to the point that you can take a Bitcoin vacation in Tarpon Springs.

[MemoryDealers]

So what is the advantage to using this over Visa/MC? No chargebacks?

Yep and you get geek/libertarian cred.

And save thousands of dollars a month in credit card fees depending on the sales volume.

[BitPay Business Solutions]

And save thousands of dollars a month in credit card fees depending on the sales volume.

I'm looking forward to the day I can fly to Tokyo, Dubai, and all over the world, and NEVER have to change my money every time I get off the plane.  Just load up bitcoins on my phone, and go.

[infofront]

As much as I like the 2girls1coin video, this product does not have a place in the market. PayPal barely scratched the surface of retail with millions of invested dollars. Credit cards are the IPv4 of retail, the industry workhorse that's always "just about" to be replaced.

It has a place in the market to the extent that people are using Bitcoins. If Bitcoin doesn't have a place in the market, then your statement is correct.

Your comparison with Paypal isn't quite valid. The Bitpay solution is more like a way for a bar to accept euros or yen, and will be in demand to the extent that euros or yen (or Bitcoins) are present in the economy.

And credit cards, as a medium (a plastic rectangle piece in your wallet) will be gone soon. See Google Wallet.

The comparison with PayPal is entirely relevant: here we have a massive company with 100 million of active customers and 70 billion annual turnover. They could easily build a mobile application that enables the bar to accept euros or yens from the user's PayPal account. Such an application would be thousands of times more interesting to the bar than Bit-Pay mobile, since thousands times more people have non-zero PayPal accounts than bitcoin balances. Yet what does PayPal do ? They issue their own credit card - they want a piece of the credit card action ! That's because even for PayPal the network effect is too faint for retailers to bother implementing their system.

Online and e-commerce is where ecurrency works. If it succeeds there, maybe, just maybe there's a chance in the retail world, but this product does not have, at the moment, any place in the market.

As for credit cards going away, let's not get ahead of ourselves. The physical aspect changed from carbon copy to magstripe to chip and now to NFC. But the same old credit card cartel gets to steal 3% of your purchase, represented by MasterCard in the case of Google Wallet.

I wouldn't want to use paypal through my cellphone at a bar because it would be much less cumbersome to whip out a card. Also, whether a bar accepts paypal or a credit card, they're going to have to pay high fees. Essentially then, accepting paypal would provide no advantage whatsoever.

Bitcoin payments may be as cumbersome as paypal, but they have the advantage of not having fees (or a low fee, like bit-pay's).

[BubbleBoy]

The advantage of not having fees does not materialize for the client, so he's unlikely to care that the shop is saving money. The customer drives the demand for a payment method - the shops are forced to follow or loose market share. The shops would get rid of credit cards in a hart beat if they could get the customers to pay with cash.

So aside of the phony geek appeal, what does this system offer to the customer ? Credit cards offer interest free loans for up to 2 months, emergency funding past that period, and money back guarantee. Bitcoin offers final indisputable transactions  - why do you think customers will prefer it ? Don't even get me started on the clunky desktop client that kills your harddrive.