How do you explain BTC to a friend or family member that has no idea?

My family thinks I'm crazy for believing that BTC will succeed. I'm trying to educate those close to me about the benefits of BTC but can't seem to find the right words. Any help?

Yeah, it would be nice to hear some expert opinions. Or some good experiences.

It's basically internet cash; no personal information required to buy products. As far as convincing them that it will succeed... nobody really knows that for sure. Also by success, if you mean that it will reach 10k by two years' time, of course they are going to think that you are crazy. I think that, but still no one really knows for sure. Anyways, to convince them of its value, the easiest way is to compare ownership of bitcoins to ownership of shares of Western Union. By owning bitcoins, you are part owner in the globally accepted way to transfer money quickly and cheaply; and they need bitcoins to make that transaction. There are other uses and so on but limit the explanation to that for now. Also, who cares if they think you are crazy? The fact that ordinary people think bitcoiners are crazy, but very talented tech stars are jumping on the idea of bitcoin, is even more of a confirmation to me that I am truly apart of something revolutionary in its earlier stages and may be able to ride this to some degree of success.

edit: I have never been to a tropical island and would sure like to someday.

Don't be too excited ("Tomorrow everybody will use bitcoin", "It will change the world" ecc) and explain it like it's a new car with very interesting feature.
If they are bored, don't reply with phrases like "Don't you understand? It's Awesome", instead change the subject and then talk about another feature of bitcoin.

Remember that people need time to understand so innovative and complex things, so don't be hasty if they don't like it immediately as much as you do.

Do more research
And show them you can answer the questions they gonna ask.

You can also find some getting started videos in this forum.

Good Luck

Throw salt in their eyes, kick them in the knee, steal their wallet, and scream "THIS WOULDN'T HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU HAD YOUR MONEY IN CRYPTO!"

It is Magic Internet Money Cool

A web of money where each strand constitutes the others.
About as simple as I can put it at dinner parties where alcohol is involved.

It's a computer game. You can win it by buying low and selling high. Tongue

Just tell them:

"All you have to do is ...believe."

"Believe in me."

"And that's not all, folks."

explaining the details is not a 2 minute conversation if you want them to truly understand. so ill give a shot at the lengthy version (ill try to not use long geeky words)

firstly a bank that prints money, and stores it, limiting peoples access to it to certain daily ATM withdrawal limits and requiring identification just to allow them to hold it in the first place and to then remove more then the ATM daily allowance.

well bitcoin is nothing like that
firstly there is the blockchain. but lets call it a database and imagine the public key is a username and the private key is your password.

imagine creating a trade to give someone money, your computer/you creates a transaction containing your username, how much you want to send and the username of who you want to send it to. it then makes a copy of that transaction and mashes it up using your password, the transaction mashup is a signature, unique to the transaction and the password used to make it. your transaction + signature gets sent to everyone on the network and eventually arrives at some specialist computers. these computers work together and take in all the transactions created every ten minutes and join them together to form a block of transactions. using a mashup of certain information of that block along with information of the previous block. it does some clever computer stuff to ensure it cannot be messed around with.
because the information is now linked to the previous blocks information it forms a chain of transaction blocks. and the transactions are now locked in. and classed as confirmed transactions.

this new block is then read by all the computers and the individual computers now have an updated database of transactions, all showing the chain of transactions before it.

the database shows all usernames and current balance. but without having the password to an individuals username. no one can mess with the data.

thats as simple as i can word it..

now to explain the benefits.

with credit cards, when you buy something. the money does not move instantly from your bank. although the shop has seen that you have funds available on your card and sent a request to your bank to be paid. allowing you to walk away. the money stays in your account or moves around the banking system for a few days/weeks.
retailers pay large fee's for that slow system and have the risk that a bank or individual can decline the funds movement well after the customer has gone. leaving the retailer out of pocket.

bitcoins however ensures once the transaction is confirmed (locked into a block) it is then the sole property of the recipient. (no 3-5 day delays) or risk of chargeback/declining transfer after the fact.

bank notes are printed without limits, which makes a bank note value only worth "the paper its printed on".
where as bitcoin and gold have a finite amount. there is not enough to share equally between all 7 billion people. so it makes these things more valuable as people demand it.

bitcoin does not hold any physical weight or require vehicles or manpower to move it between owners. so bitcoin has a better usefulness of transacting then gold.

bank notes can be burned, torn up, lost down the side of your sofa, taken out of circulation by redesign, etc.
bitcoins are protected by the private key, and if you never give anyone the private key(in person or leaving your computer open to hackers) or send funds to someone to look after for you. then you will never lose your funds.
Bitcoin security is now a big deal. do not lose control of your bitcoins

banks put limits on how much you can withdraw, and even if your allowed an account.
bitcoins doesnt care who you are or how much you want to move.

now some safety points to mention

any transaction activity whether criminal and honest can be transacted with bitcoins. because as i said before. the bitcoin code does not care. all laws broken should be investigated by the authorities that made the laws. and to note that bank notes have been involved in more crimes then bitcoin. even though the banknotes are suppose to be regulated and controlled.

no single person or government can take bitcoins out of your control. unless you hand them the private key or send them the coins.

last note to remember. don't give anyone your private keys, don't send funds to someone you don't trust, or unable to take to court if they later become untrustworthy. and make sure no one can break into your method of protecting/storing your private key by hacking or coercion.

the same would be said for gold/bank notes. don't give out your safe combinations. don't allow people you don't trust to hold your gold and make sure they cannot break into your safe by force or coercion

Quote from: astrowilliam on March 22, 2014, 01:48:21 AM

My family thinks I'm crazy for believing that BTC will succeed. I'm trying to educate those close to me about the benefits of BTC but can't seem to find the right words. Any help?

Solution:

Have you and your family members take IQ tests together, after getting results, explain to them that they should just STFU and listen to you.

its a magic internet money

more secure, digital checks. Your signatures move your wealth.

Don't bother, just like with computers there are people who will remain stubborn and never bother learning about it, while the rest of the population will do their research and just use google, it isn't fucking hard, I have very little programming experience and immediately knew that Bitcoin wasn't a scam/ponzi scheme and so on because of the information I saw like it being open source, some people just won't be receptive to the idea especially people who directly benefit from all the shit governments are doing around the world.

My parents have only just learned how to use computers competently so I know there's no bloody way they're going to learn something like Bitcoin either, I might get lucky and they might ask me at some point if the economy collapses, but I doubt it.

Tell them that it's not cash, it has no owner, no corporation behind it, and the network is made up of millions of people. The network is currently 300 times more powerful than the top 500 of the worlds most powerful super computers combined.

Tell them that Bitcoin isn't a stock, it's simply an alternative to an obsolete 100 year old financial system. Tell them that Bitcoin is a logical evolutionary step for a financial system in your opinion (if that's how you feel). Tell them to research it for themselves.

When talking to family, they aren't so much concerned with the technical part; they are likely interested in why you personally use it. Focus on why you think it's a good idea to use it instead of attempting to explain the encryption/mining/blockchain...

Quote from: Beliathon on March 22, 2014, 03:40:27 AM

Quote from: astrowilliam on March 22, 2014, 01:48:21 AM

My family thinks I'm crazy for believing that BTC will succeed. I'm trying to educate those close to me about the benefits of BTC but can't seem to find the right words. Any help?

Solution:

Have you and your family members take IQ tests together, after getting results, explain to them that they should just STFU and listen to you.

This is it.

On a serious note , the way I convince most of my friends to join it is by telling them how they can reap profits from the system rather than convincing them that Bitcoin is a better financial system xD