Bitcoin is unfair to the non tech-savvy

[BitchicksHusband]

I think there's some truth to this.  I recently convinced my aunt to buy bitcoin.  Just setting up a Coinbase account on her phone (because her computer is full of viruses) took hours.  And further hours of me on the phone with her.  Finally I just bought the coins for her and I'm trying to get her Coinbase account secure enough to send the coins to her.  It is WAY too difficult for somebody in their 70s.

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[Raystonn]

Most people don't pay attention to security of banking, because all transactions are revocable with USD.  If their funds are stolen, they complain to the bank and they get it back.  Options moving forward are 1) Make BTC transactions revocable, 2) Make wallets unhackable, 3) Let the common person deal with a revocable asset backed by Bitcoin rather than Bitcoin itself, 4) Educate the consumer on security best practices.

I don't think #1 or #2 are feasible.  I don't think #4 is realistic if we want mass adoption.

[Xch4ng3]

You've got two people in the BTC world. The ones who are just pissed because they weren't an early adopter and the ones who are scared to dip their toes into Bitcoin.

You can't fix the first one but you can make BTC easier to work with by educating people instead of laughing them away. Having a BTC wallet is the same as a physical wallet (obviously with the exception of it being digital), you need to apply your own security practices that you would in real life. I see a lot of people complain about loosing their funds and eventually you find out it was because of their own error, IE uploading an unencrypted wallet file to Dropbox and then having their Dropbox account compromised.

[Raystonn]

Most of this world doesn't even know what "encrypted wallet" or "dropbox" is.  Most of this world sees no problem surfing to random porn sites on the same computer where they install all their Bitcoin apps.  Most of this world ignores error messages from their computer, such as "your antivirus has expired".

Security for a real wallet involves keeping it out of others' hands.  Security for a digital wallet is completely different.

[Hyena]

You've got two people in the BTC world. The ones who are just pissed because they weren't an early adopter and the ones who are scared to dip their toes into Bitcoin.

You can't fix the first one but you can make BTC easier to work with by educating people instead of laughing them away. Having a BTC wallet is the same as a physical wallet (obviously with the exception of it being digital), you need to apply your own security practices that you would in real life. I see a lot of people complain about loosing their funds and eventually you find out it was because of their own error, IE uploading an unencrypted wallet file to Dropbox and then having their Dropbox account compromised.

Or making a photo of your paper wallet and uploading it to the internet for everyone to see

[ShakyhandsBTCer]

You've got two people in the BTC world. The ones who are just pissed because they weren't an early adopter and the ones who are scared to dip their toes into Bitcoin.

You can't fix the first one but you can make BTC easier to work with by educating people instead of laughing them away. Having a BTC wallet is the same as a physical wallet (obviously with the exception of it being digital), you need to apply your own security practices that you would in real life. I see a lot of people complain about loosing their funds and eventually you find out it was because of their own error, IE uploading an unencrypted wallet file to Dropbox and then having their Dropbox account compromised.

Or making a photo of your paper wallet and uploading it to the internet for everyone to see

These are all examples of things that non tech-savvy people would likely do

[devphp]

Bitcoin traders are sometimes accused of unfairly profiting from an opaque asset beyond the understanding of ordinary people.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/currency/2014/07/bidding-on-bitcoin.html

Yesterday I met a couple of my old classmates on the street. They asked about Bitcoin and started to whine that most people don't understand the mathematical fundamentals behind Bitcoin and therefore had no realistic chance to invest when it was cheap. Of course, I encouraged them to invest now (better late than never) but seems that people generally rather enjoy wallowing in their own self-pity than take steps to adapt and overcome.

Even in this forum I have seen demeaning opinions about people who bought in when Bitcoin was trading single digits --- "they are not real investors and their earnings are equivalent to winning with a lottery ticket".

I can see that these issues can raise some negative emotions and Bitcoin has even not risen to 6666$ yet . What's the worst case scenario to follow? Bitcoin Jesus getting beaten up by angry conventional Warren Buffer apprentices?

I hope you did tell your classmates there are a few promising altcoins which are still cheap and which can dethrone Bitcoin. I guess you didn't. They will blame you later that you didn't, be sure of that.

[cbeast]

I wanted to be in the NBA. It's not fair that I can't play BBall.

[Hyena]

Bitcoin traders are sometimes accused of unfairly profiting from an opaque asset beyond the understanding of ordinary people.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/currency/2014/07/bidding-on-bitcoin.html

Yesterday I met a couple of my old classmates on the street. They asked about Bitcoin and started to whine that most people don't understand the mathematical fundamentals behind Bitcoin and therefore had no realistic chance to invest when it was cheap. Of course, I encouraged them to invest now (better late than never) but seems that people generally rather enjoy wallowing in their own self-pity than take steps to adapt and overcome.

Even in this forum I have seen demeaning opinions about people who bought in when Bitcoin was trading single digits --- "they are not real investors and their earnings are equivalent to winning with a lottery ticket".

I can see that these issues can raise some negative emotions and Bitcoin has even not risen to 6666$ yet . What's the worst case scenario to follow? Bitcoin Jesus getting beaten up by angry conventional Warren Buffer apprentices?

I hope you did tell your classmates there are a few promising altcoins which are still cheap and which can dethrone Bitcoin. I guess you didn't. They will blame you later that you didn't, be sure of that.

Not to those particular individuals but I have promoted Peercoins to several other old friends and course mates in the past.

[Benjig]

Most people don't pay attention to security of banking, because all transactions are revocable with USD.  If their funds are stolen, they complain to the bank and they get it back.  Options moving forward are 1) Make BTC transactions revocable, 2) Make wallets unhackable, 3) Let the common person deal with a revocable asset backed by Bitcoin rather than Bitcoin itself, 4) Educate the consumer on security best practices.

I don't think #1 or #2 are feasible.  I don't think #4 is realistic if we want mass adoption.

The only viable option is dealing with a revocable asset backet by bitcoin because making bitcoin revocable is stupid, thats one of the good things about it, and wallets are unhackeable , what hackers hack are the passwords or the computer itself not the wallet, its like any credit card numbers stolen by a keylogger.

[Hyena]

Most people don't pay attention to security of banking, because all transactions are revocable with USD.  If their funds are stolen, they complain to the bank and they get it back.  Options moving forward are 1) Make BTC transactions revocable, 2) Make wallets unhackable, 3) Let the common person deal with a revocable asset backed by Bitcoin rather than Bitcoin itself, 4) Educate the consumer on security best practices.

I don't think #1 or #2 are feasible.  I don't think #4 is realistic if we want mass adoption.

The only viable option is dealing with a revocable asset backet by bitcoin because making bitcoin revocable is stupid, thats one of the good things about it, and wallets are unhackeable , what hackers hack are the passwords or the computer itself not the wallet, its like any credit card numbers stolen by a keylogger.

Good point because it would be easy to prove that you really have the bitcoins you claim to have while with gold backed currencies you must physically visit the vaults in order to verify the existence of the gold.

[Xch4ng3]

Most of this world doesn't even know what "encrypted wallet" or "dropbox" is.  Most of this world sees no problem surfing to random porn sites on the same computer where they install all their Bitcoin apps.  Most of this world ignores error messages from their computer, such as "your antivirus has expired".

Security for a real wallet involves keeping it out of others' hands.  Security for a digital wallet is completely different.

IMHO good security measures should also account for the worst case scenario. When it comes to computer security I think it's much safer to assume when you will be compromised and not if. Obviously in the perfect world everyone would be able to have an isolated machine to make BTC transactions from but we all know that's not going to happen. Next best thing to do is to ensure in the worst case scenario you don't suffer much.

Going to be visiting random porn sites?

Fine your choice, at least use a secure browser, ensure your computer protection is up to date and that you don't do anything like accepting random downloads that say freeporn.exe or run untrusted plugins and and ensure your wallets are backed up elsewhere and encrypted.

Either way I still believe the majority of people are too scared to use Bitcoin because they don't understand it, much like the older generation when it comes to anything technical. I'm sure everyone has at least one family member who refuses to do online banking or something similar because they're concerned about security. More time spent educating and increasing adoption of Bitcoin would do everyone some good.

[Brassguy]

Steel is unfair... Our bronze weapons can't stand up to their weapons...
Gunpowder is unfair... It costs a lot to train my knights and any peasant can shoot them with 10 minutes of training...
The loom is unfair... It can make fabric faster than me.... And I don't have enough money to buy one
The oil industry is unfair... I'd have to go out in the hot sun and dig a well...

I'll just stop now...and say...

Life isn't fair... There is always someone better, faster, stronger, smarter, more capitalized, etc, etc than you... Work hard and be creative... And don't be afraid to fail, it's the only time you actually learn anything.

Or you can just tell your friends to grow up

[wachtwoord]

So you need to understand something complex to be able to make a good investment and make money? Sounds like the most fair thing in the world to me. 

[Bitobsessed]

I don't get people who complain about having missed the boat on bitcoin. There are many penny stocks or sometimes even regular stocks that go up a lot more than bitcoin. So what? You can still trade it and profit from it.

So you need to understand something complex to be able to make a good investment and make money? Sounds like the most fair thing in the world to me. 

It is also a lot easier to buy and trade cryptocurrencies than it is a penny stock on the NYSE, NASDAQ, etc.

[Harley997]

Most of this world doesn't even know what "encrypted wallet" or "dropbox" is.  Most of this world sees no problem surfing to random porn sites on the same computer where they install all their Bitcoin apps.  Most of this world ignores error messages from their computer, such as "your antivirus has expired".

Security for a real wallet involves keeping it out of others' hands.  Security for a digital wallet is completely different.

This is exactly the issue. When people do these kinds of things they will ultimately lose their bitcoin. When this happens often enough, it will cause bitcoin to get a worse rep then it has now.

[LiteCoinGuy]

The internet is too techy for most pople to understand, it will never get big.

10 years later: OMG, did you see my photo of my pet dog?

People use internet banking when they don't understand it, and more people will use bitcoin at the software gets more user friendly and the ideas bed down in people's minds. It's early days yet.

i agree here. and whats wrong when the people who are more clever and are more willing to learn things get a better profit than others? nothing.
the average joe will get some benefits from BTC too in the future, even when he will not notice that.

[LiteCoinGuy]

So you need to understand something complex to be able to make a good investment and make money? Sounds like the most fair thing in the world to me. 

  !

[dothebeats]

I myself am not a tech-savvy. I understand very little things when it comes to technicalities and some stuff that involves different computer terms. But heck, the purpose of bitcoin is to be used as a currency, not as an educational piece to be studied. You do not require to have a massive knowledge on how cryptography and other computer stuff to use bitcoin. You simply need to know its purpose, how to use it, how to keep your wallet safe, and why would people use it. Do most of the people using fiat study how fiat is obtained? The answer is no. As long as people know how to use it and why to use it, they would still believe in using it no matter what technicalities lie behind it.

[Catmoonglow]

"Bitcoin is hardly in a position to replace national currencies."

Famous last words...