Honey Boo Boo Asks,"WTF Is Bitcoin? Aint It Like Bacon?"

[master-P]

The names "Honey Boo Boo", "Joe Blow", "Edith Bunker", "Rose Nylund", "Anna Nichole Smith", "Jessica Simpson", "Ann Coulter", "Sarah Palin", "Kim Kardashian", and "your grandma" were all used examples of average people.  This is obvious from context even if you don't bother to search for any of these names on the internet.

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

[DannyHamilton]

The names "Honey Boo Boo", "Joe Blow", "Edith Bunker", "Rose Nylund", "Anna Nichole Smith", "Jessica Simpson", "Ann Coulter", "Sarah Palin", "Kim Kardashian", and "your grandma" were all used examples of average people.  This is obvious from context even if you don't bother to search for any of these names on the internet.

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

The OP seems to think so.  It is up to each individual to determine for themselves how much they trust the opinion of the OP.

Based on some of the other posts that I've seen from them, I don't value their opinion very much on any topics.

[Bit_Happy]

The names "Honey Boo Boo", "Joe Blow", "Edith Bunker", "Rose Nylund", "Anna Nichole Smith", "Jessica Simpson", "Ann Coulter", "Sarah Palin", "Kim Kardashian", and "your grandma" were all used examples of average people.  This is obvious from context even if you don't bother to search for any of these names on the internet.

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

FYI:
Sarah Palin & Kim Kardashian are not nearly as smart as "Joe Blow".

[bananaControl]

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

Isn't this joke about USAnians getting a bit old? I don't have to look far to see overweight and ignorant people in the EU. And in fact, some of the most open minded and kind people I have met were people who moved to my country from the USA.

[Keeminakar]

My wife asks me questions like that about bitcoin

[Bit_Happy]

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

Isn't this joke about USAnians getting a bit old? I don't have to look far to see overweight and ignorant people in the EU. And in fact, some of the most open minded and kind people I have met were people who moved to my country from the USA.

Perhaps they moved away from the USA because they were open minded and kind people?
I Love some things about the USA, but the "average American" is pretty scary these days.

[DannyHamilton]

I Love some things about the USA world, but the "average American human" is pretty scary these days.

FTFY

 

[Bit_Happy]

I Love some things about the USA world, but the "average American human" is pretty scary these days.

FTFY

 

I still have some optimism about the "average person", but education needs to radically improve soon.
Pooblic Sckool hads an effection on my ebilaties.

[franky1]

i hate comparing gold/paypal to bitcoin.. but its what average joe understands.

so: walkthrough
1) gold is not insured by a government should you lose it, you cant simply ask your bank for a new lump of gold in the manner you ask for a new debit card. you need to learn how to secure and look after gold yourself.

telling people the combination to your safe is risky, ptting your gold into a strangers safe is even more riskier, gold is not like FIAT at all.

2) be aware that gold prices change alot more then FIAT prices

3) replace the word 'gold' with 'bitcoin' and you are getting the picture.

4) metal is heavy and takes effort to move between people, having to use postal services to transport it. bitcoin is not metal. its computer code. which can travel the world in seconds, like email. so imagine where posting a letter became email, where instead of packaging it up into a box to send on a truck, a program on your computer sends the valuable message instead.

5) if you have ever used paypal you have a username and password to get to play around with your wealth, the username is your identity. and the password is your proof that the identity belongs to you. where you are safe to tell people your username so they can send you funds. but never ever tell anyone your password. Well bitcoin is similar. the public key is your username. you can have millions of them if you want and you dont even need to register or fill in lots of forms to get the keys. the private key, that is your password. DONT TELL ANYONE

6) the private key is the most important thing of all. the private is not only the proof of access but the final public key is created via the private key. you can make, as i said before many private keys and they all generate a public key that only responds to that private key

7) if talking about public and private has started to lose your understanding then replace public with username and private with password. to get you back on track.

if you want to go into more detail on how the transactions work, read-on. or use this point as a chance to make yourself a coffee

9) imagine a cashiers cheque. it has a payee line, an amount and a bunch of numbers along the bottom to represent who it is from. when cashing a cheque. a clearing house service will check the FROM information to ensure funds are available. the clearing house will take a few days changing the balance of where the funds came from. and then crediting you with that amount. the banks instead of just reading the ledger of every cheque ever processed to see who sent what to who. to get a proper balance of who owns what at any point in time. they have a separate "balance" database that corresponds to the ledger of.. 'cheque stubs'.
with bitcoin its similar at the start it needs to know where the funds came from and that the person is authorized to send them, the amount being sent, and the recipients details. BUT instead of having a easy to use "account balance" database that can be manipulated (printing money) the proof of value held is done purely by adding up and subtracting the ledger/cheque stubs to get the total.

10) most of you new people dont need to know all the intricate details of how cheques work. same for bitcoin. as long as you know that it does work and is safe. well bitcoin is ALOT safer then cheque clearing and bank account balances in this respect.

11) the even better part is that there is not one single bank/clearing house that has all the copies of the ledger/cheque stubs. with bitcoin anyone has the entire ledger/cheque stub listings and anyone can, with the right program/website be able to check the total value currently held by any public address.

12) this stops people/banks from tampering with it, because if the millions of people who have a copy, notice a single ledger/cheque stub listing that has been altered or does not show the value previously existing in that persons previous ledger/stub. it would be ignored.

[iluvpie60]

Thought this would be better as a discussion and didn't want to hijack someone's thread...

I don't at all claim to be an expert, I'm just learning and overwhelmed by information overload...and I'm trying hard to get the gist of it but I recognize a lot of this is challenging for me to understand...and I've literally been absorbing information for 3 or 4 days straight...and I STILL have questions just on getting signed up and getting started, and the answers I'm getting help about 45% but leave HUGE gaps in what I need to know. That's because I genuinely desire to know and learn.

Joe Blow...not so much.

And it got me thinking about Mainstream America (or any population, but mainly ours because they're long on dumbass, short on connect the dots, with the attention span of a carrot)...and how this is going to happen.

How exactly is the mainstream public supposed to feel excited about bitcoin when they get handed this kind of information from tech and dev nerds on how to secure their money?

Mainstream public is used to "here's my card/scan/receipt/done" and an online account they can keep up with their purchase and balance...and a password...and somebody else to make sure their stuff is secure.

Downloading stuff and all this encryption and python talk isn't going to help BTC win popularity points. That is over the head of most of mainstream.

So, pretend Edith Bunker or Rose Nylund, or Anna Nichole Smith or Jessica Simpson or Ann Coulter or Sarah Palin or Kim Kardashian or Honey Boo Boo wants to start buying bitcoin...

Please share how you'd explain bitcoin and how to use it with them because that's about the mentality level of the ones who will make or break btc becoming a long term "thing" in life.

How would you handle it?

Say you encounter one of them, or your grandma, or someone who isn't much of a techno nerd and doesn't spend a lot of time online...please offer your easy 1-2-3 walkthrough that would help them go from zero knowledge to off and running with the rest of the "insiders" in the shortest amount of time - without expecting them to read anything more than the "terms of service" or whatever.

I see this as a huge barrier to mainstream use...even though I've pointed out the google glass and eaze app coming soon...might be a snap to nod twice and make a bitcoin transaction but I can see an instant breakdown when Joe Blow goes, "okay, wtf is bitcoin?"

Your walkthroughs are welcome...

Look at everything that is happening. Read my thread on this and you will see bitcoin isn't really going anywhere. At most it will replace Paypal, but people are very self deluded and believe that it "HAS TO" replace Paypal or become bigger. No it doesn't have to become bigger or have more volume. It's all supply and demand. Right now there isn't much demand.


Here is an excerpt from my thread I think will provide insight on a truthful look at btc.

""Personally, I incur 0% fees per year on my credit cards. All of them have no annual fee, no fees for bank transfers ever on my cards, no late payment fees ever for an unlimited amount of times, 1 and 2% cash back on everything(one of my cards is 1% but it is MasterCard I have to sometimes use), I get 5% cash back on purchases in the rotating 3 month categories(I  have 4 credit cards all linked to one b ank account, and whichever card has the 5% off of whatever I am buying I use that). So it becomes extremely wrong to advocate Bitcoin be used for rich/middle/lower middle class people. I only make 47,000 a year Salary, I am 24 years old, 2 years out of college and I am at my first "REAL" job, to tell me to use Bitcoin and get some fees converting from Fiat to BTC, then I spend the BTC, then guess what??? I need more BTC, lets incur more fees converting from Fiat to BTC. Don't you see BTC is really for poor people? If poor people only use BTC back and forth between each other it would be wonderful, but that isn't going to happen for a long long long time, 10s of years later maybe, MAYBE people will all be tech savvy. MAYBE. But BTC doesn't solve any problems for the majority of people and you know it.""


If you wanna read my thread head over to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=558479.0 as i am directly talking about this kinda thing.

[iluvpie60]

i hate comparing gold/paypal to bitcoin.. but its what average joe understands.

so: walkthrough
1) gold is not insured by a government should you lose it, you cant simply ask your bank for a new lump of gold in the manner you ask for a new debit card. you need to learn how to secure and look after gold yourself.

telling people the combination to your safe is risky, ptting your gold into a strangers safe is even more riskier, gold is not like FIAT at all.

2) be aware that gold prices change alot more then FIAT prices

3) replace the word 'gold' with 'bitcoin' and you are getting the picture.

4) metal is heavy and takes effort to move between people, having to use postal services to transport it. bitcoin is not metal. its computer code. which can travel the world in seconds, like email. so imagine where posting a letter became email, where instead of packaging it up into a box to send on a truck, a program on your computer sends the valuable message instead.

5) if you have ever used paypal you have a username and password to get to play around with your wealth, the username is your identity. and the password is your proof that the identity belongs to you. where you are safe to tell people your username so they can send you funds. but never ever tell anyone your password. Well bitcoin is similar. the public key is your username. you can have millions of them if you want and you dont even need to register or fill in lots of forms to get the keys. the private key, that is your password. DONT TELL ANYONE

6) the private key is the most important thing of all. the private is not only the proof of access but the final public key is created via the private key. you can make, as i said before many private keys and they all generate a public key that only responds to that private key

7) if talking about public and private has started to lose your understanding then replace public with username and private with password. to get you back on track.

if you want to go into more detail on how the transactions work, read-on. or use this point as a chance to make yourself a coffee

9) imagine a cashiers cheque. it has a payee line, an amount and a bunch of numbers along the bottom to represent who it is from. when cashing a cheque. a clearing house service will check the FROM information to ensure funds are available. the clearing house will take a few days changing the balance of where the funds came from. and then crediting you with that amount. the banks instead of just reading the ledger of every cheque ever processed to see who sent what to who. to get a proper balance of who owns what at any point in time. they have a separate "balance" database that corresponds to the ledger of.. 'cheque stubs'.
with bitcoin its similar at the start it needs to know where the funds came from and that the person is authorized to send them, the amount being sent, and the recipients details. BUT instead of having a easy to use "account balance" database that can be manipulated (printing money) the proof of value held is done purely by adding up and subtracting the ledger/cheque stubs to get the total.

10) most of you new people dont need to know all the intricate details of how cheques work. same for bitcoin. as long as you know that it does work and is safe. well bitcoin is ALOT safer then cheque clearing and bank account balances in this respect.

11) the even better part is that there is not one single bank/clearing house that has all the copies of the ledger/cheque stubs. with bitcoin anyone has the entire ledger/cheque stub listings and anyone can, with the right program/website be able to check the total value currently held by any public address.

12) this stops people/banks from tampering with it, because if the millions of people who have a copy, notice a single ledger/cheque stub listing that has been altered or does not show the value previously existing in that persons previous ledger/stub. it would be ignored.

I have to tell you, Number 4 is wrong. People buy and trade on futures of gold and on IOUs. This is done electronically too, you don't need to ever have the gold, and chances are when you buy it you will not be receiving it unless you opt to choose for that (most people don't because it is easier to sell later).

[iluvpie60]

So this Honey Boo Boo is an example of the average people in America? Good to know

Isn't this joke about USAnians getting a bit old? I don't have to look far to see overweight and ignorant people in the EU. And in fact, some of the most open minded and kind people I have met were people who moved to my country from the USA.

There are many studies that show being overweight is actually healthier than being average weight. Maybe we are on to something! Or maybe we all sit at a desk for our jobs and commute too much and don't sleep enough and have no energy to do anything, + all the fat in foods and horrible stuff we eat also.

[lynn_402]

I have to tell you, Number 4 is wrong. People buy and trade on futures of gold and on IOUs. This is done electronically too, you don't need to ever have the gold, and chances are when you buy it you will not be receiving it unless you opt to choose for that (most people don't because it is easier to sell later).

The problem with this is that you have to trust a third party to honour the IOUs, and rely on overpaid middlemen to do the transfer. Bitcoin is much more practical in that regard, so I think Franky's argument #4 is quite valid.

[franky1]

4) metal is heavy and takes effort to move between people, having to use postal services to transport it. bitcoin is not metal. its computer code. which can travel the world in seconds, like email. so imagine where posting a letter became email, where instead of packaging it up into a box to send on a truck, a program on your computer sends the valuable message instead.

I have to tell you, Number 4 is wrong. People buy and trade on futures of gold and on IOUs. This is done electronically too, you don't need to ever have the gold, and chances are when you buy it you will not be receiving it unless you opt to choose for that (most people don't because it is easier to sell later).

what you are talking about is not true value.. but fake value.. basicaly making a bet.. its not a store of value.. thus my walkthrogh was talking about actual stores of value. meaning actual gold ownership. not a bet/gamble on a price.

take for example the winklevoss project.
the want people to invest into winklevoss.. not to buy bitcoins directly but to invest into winklevoss, where investers are hoping that winklevoss value will rise because the twins hold X amount (owned by only the twins) and the profits come from the business valuation after a price rise.. not based on investors having bitcoin and the investors own possessions have risen in price.

anyone investing into winklevoss, does not own a single bitcoin. they own a balance amount on a database on a winklevoss server..

do not be tricked into these fake schemes that are not real stores of wealth. they are purely to make more FIAT profits based on gambling. not hoarding rare materials directly.

[Bit_Happy]

...But BTC doesn't solve any problems for the majority of people and you know it."

Triple facepalm:
The value of the USD is down ~97% since the birth of the Federal Reserve and you claim "BTC doesn't solve any problems for the majority of people."
You have not convinced me. 

[franky1]

""Personally, I incur 0% fees per year on my credit cards. All of them have no annual fee, no fees for bank transfers ever on my cards, no late payment fees ever for an unlimited amount of times, 1 and 2% cash back on everything(one of my cards is 1% but it is MasterCard I have to sometimes use), I get 5% cash back on purchases in the rotating 3 month categories(I  have 4 credit cards all linked to one b ank account, and whichever card has the 5% off of whatever I am buying I use that).
If you wanna read my thread head over to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=558479.0 as i am directly talking about this kinda thing.

you dont incur fee's but the retailer does..where the hell do you think you get your 5% cashback from.. if they dont charge 5% to customers in interest. then they charge it to retailers. the rule apply the other way. where customers are charged a small fee, the retailer pays less fee's

either way there is a large 2.5%+ swing in price.. bitcoin is far cheaper. EITHER for the customer or the retailer, depending on which card payment provider they have.

bitcoin is also useful for preventing chargebacks which also cost retailers money. retailers receive the customers ACTUAL value far sooner then a credit card provider can give it.

[franky1]

...But BTC doesn't solve any problems for the majority of people and you know it."

Triple facepalm:
The value of the USD is down ~97% since the birth of the Federal Reserve and you claim "BTC doesn't solve any problems for the majority of people."
You have not convinced me.  

USD is down 97%.... to those that do not understand what this means.. try putting a dollar into context of the price of car fuel, a loaf of bread, average rent/mortgage price.

then price those items from the date of the birth of federal reserve. and you will see that the dollar value has changed alot.

basically a loaf of bread has not been the same price for decades. neither has car fuel or average rent/mortgage

[twiifm]

what you are talking about is not true value.. but fake value.. basicaly making a bet.. its not a store of value.. thus my walkthrogh was talking about actual stores of value. meaning actual gold ownership. not a bet/gamble on a price.

take for example the winklevoss project.
the want people to invest into winklevoss.. not to buy bitcoins directly but to invest into winklevoss, where investers are hoping that winklevoss value will rise because the twins hold X amount (owned by only the twins) and the profits come from the business valuation after a price rise.. not based on investors having bitcoin and the investors own possessions have risen in price.

anyone investing into winklevoss, does not own a single bitcoin. they own a balance amount on a database on a winklevoss server..

do not be tricked into these fake schemes that are not real stores of wealth. they are purely to make more FIAT profits based on gambling. not hoarding rare materials directly.

The irony here is that BTC is not "real" value either.   Its a credit someone received for solving a math problem.

[DannyHamilton]

The irony here is that BTC is not "real" value either.   Its a credit someone received for solving a math problem.

You are mistaken, and clearly don't understand how bitcoin works.

[twiifm]

The irony here is that BTC is not "real" value either.   Its a credit someone received for solving a math problem.

You are mistaken, and clearly don't understand how bitcoin works.

So how do bitcoins come into existence?