Is focus on adoption the most important thing?

[Este Nuno]

LTC obviously isn't improving much if not at all. If all coins focused on adoption this would create an even bigger mess. You would see random coins being accepted at random places. If the technical features behind the coin have proven themselves enough, adoption will come with time.

Another thing regarding Litecoin specifically:

Yes, at one point Litecoin was focused on adoption quite a bit. And you would see lots of new places accepting LTC.

Imagine that Litecoin kept up with it's adoption efforts and had strong active development pushing forward by adapting useful technologies and creating infrastructure that made it easier to use than Bitcoin? It could have been much bigger than it ever was.

Imagine it was demonstrably easier to use than Bitcoin. People would have been recommending people start out with Litecoin. It's already faster. And in this situation you would probably have Bitcoin being the one doing the copying. What would that say about Litecoin, and how much credit would Litecoin gain from that? It could have happened. But it didn't and now it's time for others to try to make it happen.

[coinsolidation]

I came up with a litmus test use case this week: Can I use it to put gas in my car?
...
Innovation is clearly important (DARPANET => worldwide web), but innovation without adoption is pretty empty.  

Your litmus test is a great milestone to achieve. I especially appreciate you comparison of Darpanet -> World Wide Web. The first was innovation driving adoption, the second was adoption driving innovation. I firmly believe that it is now time for adoption to drive innovation where currency is concerned.

Marketing and merchant adoption are important, but marketing and merchant adoption coupled with no innovation and development is akin to betting that people are sheeple.

I am a big believer in an altered quote from a corny 90s movie named “The Field of Dreams” in regards to crypto currency adoption, “if you build it they will come.” If you stop and think about it for a second, this is exactly what Satoshi did with Bitcoin, and look at how far Bitcoin has come today.

CoinHoarder, an excellent post and I agree with it in entirety. It actually prompted me to write this article today, I would appreciate your feedback.

Your quoted quotation reminded me of this

It's all about the security and utility of the wallet ..
If you build it .. They will come ..

Let's have many wallets built on Bitmark and competing with each other to offer utility.
If they build things on Bitmark, they will bring others.

[Este Nuno]

IMO adoption is the most important thing for cryptocurrency.
Without adoption It's just for pump/dump really useless.
We should adapt cryptocurrency in dailylife so It'll grow bigger.

Maybe most people disagree with me on this, I don't know. I admit often there are times I am prone to thinking outside of the box. I just think adoption will come naturally if your crypto currency is a vast improvement over Bitcoin and/or the current financial system, and it is not something that needs to be forced down people's throats as it will be met with skepticism and reluctance if done this way. I believe this kind of promotion is stifling the adoption of Bitcoin itself. The way people talk about it and try to force adoption onto people, it does kind of sound like a scam of some sort until people actually learn what Bitcoin is and how it works.

I think there is a big difference in forcing adoption down peoples throats and giving them something that actually provides value. If you look at Bitcoin like you say, it's useful for some people right now, but there are still a lot of people for whom the use cases don't really line up. And the Bitcoin community doesn't seem particularly interested in improving on that. Some people are, sure. But for the most part a lot of people think Bitcoin is perfect the way it is. I agree with your points here.

I think if you create something that people actually want to use, there's not much 'marketing' that needs to be done. If it just works, then it sells itself. Give people an actual reason to use it.

[vuduchyld]

I think I partly agree with you here after thinking it over a while longer. I may of come across as very anti-marketing in that post, but I didn't mean it quite that way. Mainly my problem is not necessarily with the marketing of crypto currencies, it is with the marketing of crypto currencies that are not innovating and improving upon Bitcoin. I liken the marketing of "copy and paste" coins to scamming via the greater fool theory.

As long as your crypto currency is innovative, is in the process of innovating, and as long as you continue to do this, then I don't really see any problem with marketing yourselves. Just don't try to shove it down people's throats, as then it is met with skepticism and reluctance, as it will seem like some sort of scam at first glance until they make the effort to learn what your crypto currency is all about.

I think we probably agree a lot more than we disagree!

[vuduchyld]

 You can use BTC to put gasoline into your car.  There's blogs of people traveling across the United States and Europe with just BTC, using intermediary services to purchase things when BTC itself is not accepted.

You CAN use BTC to put gas in your car, true, but it's those intermediary services that take away the native benefits of BTC.  If I use a QORA card or a CoinFueled card, I'm not actually utilizing BTC's advantage of reduced transaction costs compared to credit card processing.  I can't go from BTC wallet-to-gas-tank, which would be ENORMOUS and powerful. 

[vuduchyld]

... The first was innovation driving adoption, the second was adoption driving innovation.

You actually re-stated it really, really, really well....far better point than the one I clumsily tried to make.

Dammit, I hate it when developers aren't either clueless about communication or just complete jackasses.  Now I'm going to have to do a bunch of reading on Bitmark!

[coinsolidation]

You CAN use BTC to put gas in your car, true, but it's those intermediary services that take away the native benefits of BTC.  If I use a QORA card or a CoinFueled card, I'm not actually utilizing BTC's advantage of reduced transaction costs compared to credit card processing.  I can't go from BTC wallet-to-gas-tank, which would be ENORMOUS and powerful. 

It could be suggested that a trust based intermediary processor will be required in order to reduce transaction latency. When a third party is put in to the mix they handle instant transfers from account balance to account balance, and it opens the door to competing services with lower fees. If using blockchain only, there is the microtransaction problem, the safety problems of being under non trusted network control, and confirmation times to deal with. Imagine if putting gas in your car required a 6 hours confirmation because a block wasn't found quickly?

Perhaps worth discussion.

... The first was innovation driving adoption, the second was adoption driving innovation.

You actually re-stated it really, really, really well....far better point than the one I clumsily tried to make.

Dammit, I hate it when developers aren't either clueless about communication or just complete jackasses.  Now I'm going to have to do a bunch of reading on Bitmark!

LOL, yes there is a bunch of reading to do, much has been written.

This should get you started: Generic Summary, Approach to Innovation, Marking (big read), Thread with links out to lots of information

[Lauda]

Another thing regarding Litecoin specifically:

Yes, at one point Litecoin was focused on adoption quite a bit. And you would see lots of new places accepting LTC.

Imagine that Litecoin kept up with it's adoption efforts and had strong active development pushing forward by adapting useful technologies and creating infrastructure that made it easier to use than Bitcoin? It could have been much bigger than it ever was.

Imagine it was demonstrably easier to use than Bitcoin. People would have been recommending people start out with Litecoin. It's already faster. And in this situation you would probably have Bitcoin being the one doing the copying. What would that say about Litecoin, and how much credit would Litecoin gain from that? It could have happened. But it didn't and now it's time for others to try to make it happen.

Well this is all if/could have/should have. Indeed Litecoin could have gotten much further than it did right now, but well what can you do about it (now).
Sadly the development behind Litecoin was lacking and it's too late now I assume even if things were to change.
I do however doubt that any of these 'newer' coins are going to replace Bitcoin/capture such a market cap.

[vuduchyld]

It could be suggested that a trust based intermediary processor will be required in order to reduce transaction latency. When a third party is put in to the mix they handle instant transfers from account balance to account balance, and it opens the door to competing services with lower fees. If using blockchain only, there is the microtransaction problem, the safety problems of being under non trusted network control, and confirmation times to deal with. Imagine if putting gas in your car required a 6 hours confirmation because a block wasn't found quickly?

Perhaps worth discussion.



LOL, yes there is a bunch of reading to do, much has been written.

This should get you started: Generic Summary, Approach to Innovation, Marking (big read), Thread with links out to lots of information

Yes, you have done a very good job of concisely identifying one of the fundamental sets of choices with crypto in general.  The possibility exists that we could cut a LOT of fat out of the system by eliminating current fees.  I remember reading (and sorry, I can't source it) that the CEO of Overstock said that they save 8% when people use BTC.  Works fine for a purchase online, but the gas pump is a different world.  Six hours to confirm just doesn't work in that situation. 

Thanks for the link!  I have to guess that Bitmark might offer a solution?  I hope so! 

[TaunSew]

Proof that LTC ever focused on adoption?  This is the first I ever heard about it.

The way I heard about LTC was when people were spamming about how you should buy LTC (during the BTC boom) on large internet forums.  Were these paid advertising shills or just people pumping LTC after BTC itself exploded in value?

Really the only alternate coin which ever succeeded in any adoption was Doge and that was like cryptos for newbies, due to the mechanics, rampant inflation and then the Doge-billionaires who dumped the coin to death.

[coinsolidation]

It could be suggested that a trust based intermediary processor will be required in order to reduce transaction latency. When a third party is put in to the mix they handle instant transfers from account balance to account balance, and it opens the door to competing services with lower fees. If using blockchain only, there is the microtransaction problem, the safety problems of being under non trusted network control, and confirmation times to deal with. Imagine if putting gas in your car required a 6 hours confirmation because a block wasn't found quickly?

Perhaps worth discussion.

Yes, you have done a very good job of concisely identifying one of the fundamental sets of choices with crypto in general.  The possibility exists that we could cut a LOT of fat out of the system by eliminating current fees.  I remember reading (and sorry, I can't source it) that the CEO of Overstock said that they save 8% when people use BTC.  Works fine for a purchase online, but the gas pump is a different world.  Six hours to confirm just doesn't work in that situation.  

Cryptographic currency offers multiple benefits but also has limitations. For example we can store and manage our own money, send unlimited amounts to anybody without any barriers, and with minimal fees, often large transactions are faster than legacy systems. Conversely it is relatively clunky and slow for every day transactions, it cannot be sped up, and the interfaces for usage with legacy wide spread systems do not exist.

We have choices to make, do we try to come up with new things and replace what exists, or do we try hard to become part of what exists recognising that it is not an omnipotent solution to everything money related?

Within Bitmark we have named a concept micro-trust. The game provider Steam is a concrete example, we deposit funds through some methods then perform purchases instantly. Prepaid debit cards, credit cards, paypal, skrill, multiple services and many stores, giftcards and loadable credit, all of these things are examples of micro trust. The important thing to note is that we do not trust these services and companies with all of our money, only small amounts for whatever purpose we need. Micro trust for micro transactions.

We consider that the blockchain is great to store larger amounts, and to transfer funds between services. The latter point is where it can really shine.

To be usable however, for every transactions, we must become part of what exists. We will get nowhere fast if we try to get a Gas company, a gas franchise, or even a franchisee to accept our highly latent systems which require them to jump through hoops and change their infrastructure.

Back to your litmus test, consider a reloadable debit card that you could fill with daily use money from time to time quickly by depositing crypto. It's a simple solution enabled by the presence of just one service provider, made optimal by the presence of many.

As for fees, because crypto is entirely digital and isn't integrated in with heavy fee taking legacy systems, new lean startups can be created, or older companies can adopt and save money behind the scenes. 0.25% to an exchange for the conversion, and 0.75% on deposits to us to pay for the service, on currencies which change 10x that in a day and 100x that in a year, is a minor concession to make.

Where Bitmark and Marking come in, is that we enable the flow of money between people for the smallest of every day things, you can write a post or share something online and get reputation+money for it. Now imagine if the money you deposited to your daily use card, had been earned by two forum posts, a commit of some code, and a funny video shared on line? Does that not change the way money flows and the way we think of things quite a lot?

An additional point, is that we suggest crypto should be hidden through several layers of abstraction, if you can transfer money by clicking a button on a website, swap between services by linking accounts, and fill a debit card by hitting 'deposit' on-line or in an app, then why not? Blockchain and clients and daemons all still exist, they just become optional usage parts rather than required. It's perfectly feasible for people to only want to keep 25% of their weekly loose change in crypto and use it by clicking buttons, rather than 100% of their lifes savings stored in multi-secured extravagant cold storage.

None of this is exact or well defined or anything of the sort, but if you can follow the principles, and indeed agree it has some merit, then please do join in with ideas and discussion to make them reality.

[vuduchyld]

Ah hell.  You really make a LOT of sense.  I'm impressed by your thoughts and also by the way you have presented them.

But it's also a teeny weeny bit depressing, too.  I think that you're probably absolutely correct that QuikTrip is not likely to accept the latency of the blockchain with its multiple confirmations--and, yes, you're right that it would involve a massive infrastructure change.  The easiest way for me to envision QuikTrip getting involved would be through some new start-up company that provides turnkey gas pumps with BTC (or other crypto) functionality built right in, as well as some service like BitPay that allows them to convert receipts to fiat upon arrival.  Even that doesn't overcome latency, though, and it would force QuikTrip to spend a good chunk of money on a capital improvement that people might or might not use.

Because BTC is the crypto closest to significant adoption (I'm assuming, I realize, based on Dell, NewEgg, Overstock, Expedia, etc...) I tend to think about use cases in BTC terms.  And you're right...there are limitations there.  I totally appreciate the concept of sidechain transactions that you mentioned in the linked article.  If I'm spending $3000 on a new alienware laptop, maybe that transaction hits the blockchain.  If I'm spending $14 on a pizza, maybe it doesn't, or at least it doesn't right away.  

The only place you lost me a little bit was with the concept of rewarding funny videos or forum posts.  I mean, I'm not AGAINST it, but I like to think some human interactions aren't really done for transactional value.  I'd feel really strange about somebody "marking" one of my youtube videos (instead of just liking) if that meant a financial gain for me.  I'd almost hate to reduce it to that.

But I can see some areas where that would be fairly awesome...probably gaming, which I am not involved in.

DEFINITELY, DEFINITELY think the concepts are worth discussion and I look forward to learning more!  I may have to mark you by buying some BTM!  The whole discussion makes me realize that cryptos might be a little farther away from adoption than I was thinking they were.  But I'm happy to be exposed to these concepts, as a relative newcomer.

[Este Nuno]

Proof that LTC ever focused on adoption?  This is the first I ever heard about it.

The way I heard about LTC was when people were spamming about how you should buy LTC (during the BTC boom) on large internet forums.  Were these paid advertising shills or just people pumping LTC after BTC itself exploded in value?

Really the only alternate coin which ever succeeded in any adoption was Doge and that was like cryptos for newbies, due to the mechanics, rampant inflation and then the Doge-billionaires who dumped the coin to death.

Hmm, I don't have any proof other than just seeing it first hand since 2011.

CoinHorder here in the thread was a Litecoin supporter who's mentioned in his post how he advised against Litecoin focusing on adoption only and ignoring any technical advanced.

Litecoin's focus on adoption seems to have gradually faded once the market cap ballooned enough that people thought that was sufficient reason for Litecoin to continue.

[vuduchyld]

Consolidation, just wanted you to know that I bought some BTM simply because I appreciated your comments in this thread so much.

Wish I had bought a lot more. Holy shit...quite a price explosion lately! Getting some run on the Polo trollbox, too. Good work!

Man...why didn't I buy more???

[coinsolidation]

Consolidation, just wanted you to know that I bought some BTM simply because I appreciated your comments in this thread so much.

Wish I had bought a lot more. Holy shit...quite a price explosion lately! Getting some run on the Polo trollbox, too. Good work!

Man...why didn't I buy more???

If you see BTM as an investment and want to later sell it for BTC then maybe you should have bought more, and maybe you will come back in 1 year and say why didn't I buy more then too!

If you see marking as the future of money, then you probably have thousands or maybe even millions of marks, so you have enough marks to last you a life time already. Why worry? you can earn more just by doing things you enjoy and being marked.

I see it as this last thing, I have enough already, I can earn more. We even decided that the Bitmark Foundation could keep only 5000 as a reserve, to give to projects and charities in the future. It will be marked for the good work it does, so we don't need to raise funds any more.

[vuduchyld]

Consolidation, just wanted you to know that I bought some BTM simply because I appreciated your comments in this thread so much.

Wish I had bought a lot more. Holy shit...quite a price explosion lately! Getting some run on the Polo trollbox, too. Good work!

Man...why didn't I buy more???

If you see BTM as an investment and want to later sell it for BTC then maybe you should have bought more.

If you see marking as the future of money, then you probably have thousands or maybe even millions of marks, so you have enough marks to last you a life time already. Why worry? you can earn more just by doing things you enjoy and being marked.

I definitely have some more reading and research to do.  Not sure exactly how I see it just yet, but again, your point is well made.

[coinsolidation]

I definitely have some more reading and research to do.  Not sure exactly how I see it just yet, but again, your point is well made.

Read both of the top posts here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=660544.1440 - it should be enough.

[vuduchyld]

I definitely have some more reading and research to do.  Not sure exactly how I see it just yet, but again, your point is well made.

Read both of the top posts here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=660544.1440 - it should be enough.

Sometimes I think I'm reasonably intelligent.  Other times I feel really slow on the uptake.  This is one of those times I feel a little slow.  I've read about it several times and I think it's finally starting to sink in a little bit.  Mind kinda blown a little...

[vipgelsi]

We really need to get users involved and the investments will then start to really pour in.

[coinsolidation]

We really need to get users involved and the investments will then start to really pour in.

The user part happens naturally, it is a viral by nature system. I key concern is not releasing too early, to gain 25k users and lose them because we had not tested would not be good.

As for investments, none are needed, a little donation always helps though. The project solves the funding problem, for itself too.