Bitcoin Documentary!

[bitcoinstarter]

Neil,

Send us a private message as we are creating the  "kickstarter" of bitcoins:  http://www.bitcoinstarter.com -  like to list your project on our site when we launch soon.

Looking forward to this either way!

email:  bitcoinstarter@gmail.com

[neilausburn]

Awesome!

question: is this project funded via pmf or kickstart or both?

did you select "bitcoin" or "usd" for funding on pmf?

I'm using bit-pay for PMF funding; I'm going with indiegogo instead of kickstart.

Check out www.privatemoneymovie.com

[atomicswan27]

very nice documentary and very interesting. I enjoyed it a lot.

[molecular]

very nice documentary and very interesting. I enjoyed it a lot.

hm? You watched the intro where Neil talks about making the documentary?

It seems he received a bit more than 1 BTC and $5. I guess he didn't make it ;(

Or am I missing something?

[Roger_Murdock]

Wow, I started feeling guilty for "going through the motions" with my 5 posts to get out of newbie purgatory, and I spent like 30 minutes crafting a (for me, at least) pretty thoughtful and substantive post.  Apparently I got logged out in the interim or was typing it in a forbidden-to-newbie zone because it got eaten.  But just for the record, I tried.

[Roger_Murdock]

Ok, I'm going to try this again.

I just got around to trying to understand what the "world's reserve currency"-thing I keep hearing about really means:

From wikipedia:

"A reserve currency, or anchor currency, is a currency that is held in significant quantities by many governments and institutions as part of their foreign exchange reserves. It also tends to be the international pricing currency for products traded on a global market, and commodities such as oil, gold, etc.

This permits the issuing country to purchase the commodities at a marginally lower rate than other nations, which must exchange their currencies with each purchase and pay a transaction cost. For major currencies, this transaction cost is negligible with respect to the price of the commodity. It also permits the government issuing the currency to borrow money at a better rate, as there will always be a larger market for that currency than others."

So if my understanding is correct (very iffy), the U.S. dollar's status as the de facto global reserve currency is helping to prop up its value by being a significant source of demand for dollars (that whole supply/demand thing).  The dollar's primary advantages are 1) network effects (i.e., one you've become the world's reserve currency, it's a lot easier to stay the world's reserve currency) and 2) perceptions of the dollar's strength and stability vis-a-vis other world currencies (i.e., most people aren't worried that the U.S. is going to start printing trillion-dollar bills Zimbabwe-style anytime soon).  The current threat to the dollar's reserve status comes from growing doubts about the second point.  Our debt is growing at an unsustainable pace making it more likely that the U.S. will attempt to inflate its way out of it, thereby screwing over everyone who holds significant reserves.  But doubts about the second advantage also undermine the first advantage.  In other words, it seems like we're ripe for a self-perpetuating spiral.  If a non-trivial number of countries and institutions start to flee the dollar, that will undermine its value which will in turn encourage MORE countries and institutions to do the same. Rinse, lather, repeat.  Or to put it another way, if enough people expect the U.S. to lose its reserve currency status, it basically becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.  If my understanding is correct, we could see a similar spiral on the debt side.  As people lose faith in the dollar, they'll be reluctant to hold U.S. debt driving interest rates up.  But if the U.S. government's cost of borrowing spikes, that will make the debt even more unsustainable, further undermining confidence in the dollar.  Does that all sound about right? Does it also sound pretty much inevitable?

Somewhat related random thought: one of the objections many of my friends have when i tell them about Bitcoin is this question: "what if someone comes up with an even better currency?"  It occurs to me that the same question could be asked of everyone holding U.S. fiat, except the question there is "what if someone already did?"

[cleanbit]

I think as a currency bitcoin is of enormous value for the simple reason that you can transmit any amount you want instantly across boarders. That and the fact that its pseudo-anonimity and p2p base means it cant be shut down like previous electronic currencies.

[molecular]

Some comments, first to Roger: you pretty much got it about USD being worlds reserve currency and also mainly why it seems to keep that status (for now). Some remarks:

• if/when foreign confidende in the USD tumbles, that money will start flowing back to the US in huges quantities. From a domestic viewpoint, that's hugely inflationary and it will hurt.
• google "Petro-Dollar". Some people go as far as saying the world reserve currency status of the USD is being "backed" by the US military. It's true to an extent: when Saddam tried to sell oil for EUR, guess what happened. Note that Iran is selling oil for gold to India now.
• A strong USD is not necessarily in the interest of the US. As James Rickards point out in his book "Currency Wars", the economies/nationstates of the world are in the process of a race to debase their currencies in order to help their economies by ways of improving exports... a death spiral.

I think as a currency bitcoin is of enormous value for the simple reason that you can transmit any amount you want instantly across boarders. That and the fact that its pseudo-anonimity and p2p base means it cant be shut down like previous electronic currencies.

I much prefer to call bitcoin a money, or more specifically a commodity money instead of calling it a currency. I'm not sure why, probably because currency sounds like: "some nations fiat currency".

I think the reasons for bitcoins success are manyfold. the 2 reasons cleanbit mentioned (works rather well as electronic payment system, can't be shut down easily) are important ones, albeit not sufficient for success. I would add: "has known inflation and known maximum total supply". Without that scarcity, bitcoin wouldn't have worked out.

And one more remark to Roger: yes, you're right, bitcoin has the first mover advantage and as long as noone comes up with any substantial improvement, it will remain the cryptocurrency.

[centralplan]

Put a BTC address.

[Conch]

Brilliant documentary Neil. I favourited it.

Sadly I live in the UK and I have no idea how the economy system works in America, we have a poor economic system in the UK, which bring me to the subject that this year we have the London 2012 olympics, something I'll never see as I live too far away, the funding for it, is like 4 - 6 billion GBP.

I'd rather they just spent the money on something useful, we have a severe case of job loss as it is! Not being ignorant, just my thoughts

[VEscudero]

Good job guys!, keep on pushing bitcoin to wider audiences.