How to contribute to bitcoin ?

[walidzohair]

Note. I have posted the below text in some where else but I Want as many readers and I dunno where to publish it else but the main forum.

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Bitcoin success is about: Popularity which leads to its scarcity which leads to its popularity.

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I know this is an old post, well sort of. not very old though but it is important o leave a note here for future visits of bitcoin supporters.


Well it is not always abut mining.

If you want to support bitcoin here is a list of what can be done in an ascending priority according to its importance and contribution to bitcoin cause (well up to my knowledge):

1) Leave your CPU running 24/7 while running the bitcoin client, not mining just running the client.
2) Buy some bitcoins and spend them in something you need. Even better do it on a a regular basis for let us say your weekly/monthly grocery .. etc.
3) Buy some bitcoins and hoard them as long as you do not need their value.
4) Transfer a portion of your long term investment (like retirement plan money) into bitcoins instead of gold or banks.
And Finally,
5) Cut a percentage of your weekly, monthly or whatever pay check to buy bitcoins as a long term investment (Hoarding)!.



This would Spread the currency and maximize its value.

Of course order might be different here for some other opinions, specially about hoarding, but again it is both about spreading teh currency as well as maximizing the demand (need) for it.

Couple hundred million users like that and !!

Wollah! Bitcoin is major world-class currency.!

And for GPU miners you can always use bitcoin GPU mining as a heating system

[genjix]

+ Writing and making videos.

+ Creating graphics and logos.

+ Organising events.

+ Advocacy for your favourite groups, organisations or people to accept bitcoin.

+ Supporting services you like by giving them your business.

+ Fixing up the bitcoin wiki.

+ Copy editing the wikipedia entry for bitcoin which is in a bad state ATM.

+ Writing code.

+ Consolidating and aggregating information from the forums, reddit, twitter, mailing list, IRC, blogs and articles into a central location.

+ Graphs and statistics about the economy.

- Do not waste away too much of your time on the forums getting involved in huge debates and future speculation. It just isn't productive.

[DeaDTerra]

I would say a couple of things of which you can do to contribute to the community is to come up with a service or goods that you can offer the community in exchange for Bitcoins, there's still a lot of things which you can't purchase with bitcoins. Also spreading the word and message through different means is also important

[ripper234]

I would say a couple of things of which you can do to contribute to the community is to come up with a service or goods that you can offer the community in exchange for Bitcoins, there's still a lot of things which you can't purchase with bitcoins. Also spreading the word and message through different means is also important

http://www.reddit.com/r/bitcoinideas/

[fornit]

+ Writing and making videos.

+ Creating graphics and logos.

+ Organising events.

[...]

+1

showing your faith in bitcoin by buying some is good. running the client constantly certainly improves the network. but in the end, there is still so much work to do. just making bitcoin "bigger" doesnt solve them. picking something no matter how small and doing it does. make an artist with 20 fans accept bitcoins. translate the wiki to islandic. organize the first meet-up in pukmukluktistan. and if you dont know what to do, ask somebody already involved in a project if and how you can help.
and since you already bought bitcoins you dont just do it for the warm fuzzy feeling 

maybe setting up a page solely to organize volunteers might be a good idea. it is kinda hard when you have no idea whats important and where to start.

[PrintCoins]

Top ways:

#1 Buy something from someone who didn't accept bitcoins before. Be sure to help them out.
#2 Sell something yourself for bitcoins
#3 Buy something from someone who accepts bitcoins.

I would cut out buying bitcoins with fiat and mining. I don't think those are productive ways to boost the bitcoin economy.

Some other ways:

* We use bitcoins at my work place to gamble in foosball. 1BTC per side. People that don't have 1/2 bitcoin get teamed up with someone that does and gets a .25 bitcoins out of the 1 for winning. Gambling seems to be a great way to spread around bitcoins.

* Give a gift of a bitcoin to someone who is likely to use it and help them get started.

[fornit]

bitcoin needs developers and testers, merchants and buyers, reporters and writers, artists and designers, sponsors and organizers, miners and clients, everything.
i wouldnt cut anything out, unless you can say "we can succeed without a single one of them". for example, i think its very good for the confidence in bitcoin that even during massively falling prices a majority of bitcoins never made it to the exchanges. so i think people holding onto their bitcoins and remaining totally calm are important, especially in the rough early days.

[film2240]

I wish to sell off a few things for BTC like 2 silent case fans and a few other items (I don't need them anymore).I'm not sure how successful trades for case fans and other items are on here? If people wish to buy,I'll be happy to sell for BTC (or GBP)

[westkybitcoins]

+ Writing and making videos.

+ Creating graphics and logos.

+ Organising events.

+ Advocacy for your favourite groups, organisations or people to accept bitcoin.

+ Supporting services you like by giving them your business.

+ Fixing up the bitcoin wiki.

+ Copy editing the wikipedia entry for bitcoin which is in a bad state ATM.

+ Writing code.

+ Consolidating and aggregating information from the forums, reddit, twitter, mailing list, IRC, blogs and articles into a central location.

+ Graphs and statistics about the economy.

- Do not waste away too much of your time on the forums getting involved in huge debates and future speculation. It just isn't productive.

Good list. Almost anyone who's been in bitcoin for a little while should be able to find something there to jump in on.

[Tuxavant]

This might be unpopular, but I believe that individuals with limited computing power can contribute to the security of the network by continuing to mine with no real expectation of earning an inflation or transaction award - distributing their "honest node" hashing power to combat the potential for evil collusion.

[casascius]

In my view:

+ Hold some bitcoins for their utility value, the same way you would hold a few Canadian dollars if you travel to Canada frequently.  (If you live in Canada, then I mean US dollars and the US for this example.)

+ Be willing to accept bitcoins from people who want to pay you.  Simply state that you'll accept the exchange rate at the time they make the payment, never lock in a rate, this keeps it fair for you both.  If you need USD and/or don't want to hold any BTC, give them a Bitcoin address that deposits to your MtGox account, and leave an unfunded sell order at $0.01 in there, which will auto-sell anything that arrives, at market price, as soon as the funds are confirmed.  Stipulate that their payment will be only worth what USD you get for it, if that is what you need to keep it fair - at least paying in BTC remains a viable option.

+ Offer to pay people in bitcoins anytime someone is politely refusing to be paid for a favor and you want them to accept your payment.  They will often have no problem accepting bitcoins.  Give them their bitcoins on a paper wallet (printed at bitaddress.org) if they are not tech savvy (or a physical bitcoin, assuming you have one), tell them to hold on carefully because you believe they could be worth a lot more in a year from now.  More often than not, that's exactly what they will do.

+ Hold a small amount of fiat currency in your exchange account.  This way you can always spend Bitcoins on goods and services at market value without ever worrying that you would rather hoard your coins as an investment.  You will always be able to offset any purchases with an immediate buy on the exchange if you really don't want to part with your bitcoins.

- Don't worry about running a node just to serve the network unless you are mining, or unless you have an open port on your public IP that other nodes can actually connect to.  (Yeah, some will disagree with me, but I don't think the network faces any threat of blockchain extinction that more idle outbound-only nodes will help).

- Don't worry about pricing your goods and services in BTC.  Do it if you can and if it works for you.  Otherwise, don't feel any shame about pricing something in fiat and advertising that you'll accept BTC in place of fiat.  This is sustainable and consistent and easy to manage.

[gregwtmtno]

I agree with most of what's posted here. What bitcoin need the most is to be used as part of an economy in exchange for goods and services. In other words, less commodity, more currency.

[Findeton]

I like giving bitcoins as gifts.

I also like buying things with bitcoins instead of fiat. Also, if I have to sell something I try selling it in btc.

[hoki]

The best would be buying and selling physical goods with Bitcoins.