Greece mulls Euro exit

[GideonGono]

Guys! We've derailed the thread. We are supposed to be discussing how we can get the Greeks to buy into Bitcoin.

Go to Greece and spent a week on the streets yelling about bitcoin/hand out some flyers.

Its how most grassroots and political parties do it - get the attention of a few hundred, then hope they tell 2 others each.

Great idea. But I cannot go to Greece. I'm sure there is someone here who is in greece, we could make the fliers and get them to distribute them at the rallies/riots

[molecular]

Guys! We've derailed the thread. We are supposed to be discussing how we can get the Greeks to buy into Bitcoin.

Go to Greece and spent a week on the streets yelling about bitcoin/hand out some flyers.

Its how most grassroots and political parties do it - get the attention of a few hundred, then hope they tell 2 others each.

Great idea. But I cannot go to Greece. I'm sure there is someone here who is in greece, we could make the fliers and get them to distribute them at the rallies/riots

how about handing everyone casascius coins?

[conspirosphere.tk]

I think the way would be leading by examples instead than 'splaining what BTC are and are not.
Trying to launch some micro BTC startups there, even in the underground economy seems to me the way to go.
Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

[JusticeForYou]

I think the way would be leading by examples instead than 'splaining what BTC are and are not.
Trying to launch some micro BTC startups there, even in the underground economy seems to me the way to go.
Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

Considering what they are about to go through, the Greek Government might even make BTC the official currency.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of the banks that have been 'cut off' from the ECB wouldn't mind processing tx to mtgox for a percentage.

[ribuck]

Considering what they are about to go through, the Greek Government might even make BTC the official currency.

No way. The Greek government is in a mess is because they won't/can't balance their budget (even within the 3% leeway allowed by the Euro rules). If Greece leaves the Euro, it will be to a currency of its own that it can inflate ad lib.

Bitcoin has nothing of value to offer to the Greek government. To the Greek people, on the other hand...

[JusticeForYou]

Considering what they are about to go through, the Greek Government might even make BTC the official currency.

No way. The Greek government is in a mess is because they won't/can't balance their budget (even within the 3% leeway allowed by the Euro rules). If Greece leaves the Euro, it will be to a currency of its own that it can inflate ad lib.

Bitcoin has nothing of value to offer to the Greek government. To the Greek people, on the other hand...

Yes, to the Greek People. Sorry for mistaking the Greek Government as being run by the 'People'. That was foolish of me.

[hazek]

Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

That's the only thing that has any chance of some traction since Bitcoin is so far out of their general population's world view making it extremely hard to accept as valid. But a path to avoid capital controls is surely going be attractive once their government starts limiting people's freedom with their money.

[muyuu]

Would Bitcoin withstand that a few million people started using it regularly? Not that I think it's feasible to achieve that kind of success short-term, but unless there has been some late breakthrough I'm not aware of, blockchain bloat would be terrible with that kind of activity.

[muyuu]

Would Bitcoin withstand that a few million people started using it regularly? Not that I think it's feasible to achieve that kind of success short-term, but unless there has been some late breakthrough I'm not aware of, blockchain bloat would be terrible with that kind of activity.

Should I create a gambling site inspired by Satoshi Dice so we can find out?

Would that generate activity in the ballpark of several million regular users making several daily transactions?

[Seal]

Guys! We've derailed the thread. We are supposed to be discussing how we can get the Greeks to buy into Bitcoin.

Back to the OP, I posted a suggestion for a Greek sub-forum:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=82734.0

Healthy discussions amongst the Greeks and the right promotional material translated by the forum users will help to promote the cause. I'd appreciate any +1's on the topic to get the forum admins to notice. For the record, theres nothing in it for me as I dont speak Greek.

[GideonGono]

Guys! We've derailed the thread. We are supposed to be discussing how we can get the Greeks to buy into Bitcoin.

Back to the OP, I posted a suggestion for a Greek sub-forum:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=82734.0

Healthy discussions amongst the Greeks and the right promotional material translated by the forum users will help to promote the cause. I'd appreciate any +1's on the topic to get the forum admins to notice. For the record, theres nothing in it for me as I dont speak Greek.

This is great. Exactly the kind of thing we need.

[GideonGono]

Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

That's the only thing that has any chance of some traction since Bitcoin is so far out of their general population's world view making it extremely hard to accept as valid. But a path to avoid capital controls is surely going be attractive once their government starts limiting people's freedom with their money.

Awesome! Now we are getting somewhere! How would you envision such a service working?

[caveden]

how about handing everyone casascius coins?

That's nice in some contexts (not only the one of this topic), but they're too expensive right now to be given away at large quantities... perhaps casacius should start doing some 100 and 50 mBTC coins (or lower, if viable)

[hazek]

Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

That's the only thing that has any chance of some traction since Bitcoin is so far out of their general population's world view making it extremely hard to accept as valid. But a path to avoid capital controls is surely going be attractive once their government starts limiting people's freedom with their money.

Awesome! Now we are getting somewhere! How would you envision such a service working?

No idea and I personally probably fear the monopoly on violence a bit too much in order to engage in breaking the capital control rules in a foreign country. But I imagine someone will want to take that risk and facilitate capital flow out of the country and instead of smuggling cash they can do it with bitcoins.

[conspirosphere.tk]

Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

That's the only thing that has any chance of some traction since Bitcoin is so far out of their general population's world view making it extremely hard to accept as valid. But a path to avoid capital controls is surely going be attractive once their government starts limiting people's freedom with their money.

Awesome! Now we are getting somewhere! How would you envision such a service working?

No idea and I personally probably fear the monopoly on violence a bit too much in order to engage in breaking the capital control rules in a foreign country. But I imagine someone will want to take that risk and facilitate capital flow out of the country and instead of smuggling cash they can do it with bitcoins.

S/t like that may be done in a legal way. In Greece you would have just to sell bitcoins for euros, and maybe sometimes offering some help to send them. This should still be legal (until they outlaw bitcoins).

Now, Greeks are exporting billions of euros and many of them find attractive to export capital undetected in order to not pay taxes on it; that's why they may like bitcoins. The only difficulty might be finding someone in Switzerland or wherever they want to export their money available to exchange their bitcoin for cash in person at a decent rate, assuming that they do not want use exchange agencies. I do not think that many of them would be ready to use confidently the OTC market (which is too mostly dependent on bank transactions).

Even if we may be a bit late for this, a second opportunity may likely come after the re-dracmatization, when much exported capitals will likely return, again ideally undetected, to take advantage of the huge devaluation. Then there would be quite some local demand to buy dracmas with BTC.

[hazek]

In Greece you would have just to sell bitcoins for euros,

Sure... but how would this seller get his € out of Greece? Is he Geek and willing to keep his money in Greece?

[conspirosphere.tk]

In Greece you would have just to sell bitcoins for euros,

Sure... but how would this seller get his € out of Greece? Is he Geek and willing to keep his money in Greece?

He would use the euro to buy more BTC to sell (and/or keep his stash secured or move it abroad like his clients), and so on and on. Just the how is debatable: even for him would be better to stay at large from banks as much as possible.

[muyuu]

In Greece you would have just to sell bitcoins for euros,

Sure... but how would this seller get his € out of Greece? Is he Geek and willing to keep his money in Greece?

They can do that no problem. They can transfer money anywhere in the eurozone... so far they haven't pulled off! They can deposit to Intersango or MtGox just as easily as you can.

[molecular]

how about handing everyone casascius coins?

That's nice in some contexts (not only the one of this topic), but they're too expensive right now to be given away at large quantities... perhaps casacius should start doing some 100 and 50 mBTC coins (or lower, if viable)

I've given lower-denomination physical bitcoin some thought a while back. Problem is of course the production cost. Best idea I was able to come up with back then: print tiny qr-code with privkey on a about 0.5 cm x 1.0 cm size paper, print address on other side and fold so that privkey is not visible, put everything into a drop of transparent casting resin which can be opened by hammer to redeem. Now against conterfeiting, I don't know, maybe include a hologram after all. Any ideas?

[molecular]

Maybe launching a service to facilitate capital flight?

That's the only thing that has any chance of some traction since Bitcoin is so far out of their general population's world view making it extremely hard to accept as valid. But a path to avoid capital controls is surely going be attractive once their government starts limiting people's freedom with their money.

Awesome! Now we are getting somewhere! How would you envision such a service working?

No idea and I personally probably fear the monopoly on violence a bit too much in order to engage in breaking the capital control rules in a foreign country. But I imagine someone will want to take that risk and facilitate capital flow out of the country and instead of smuggling cash they can do it with bitcoins.

S/t like that may be done in a legal way. In Greece you would have just to sell bitcoins for euros, and maybe sometimes offering some help to send them. This should still be legal (until they outlaw bitcoins).

Now, Greeks are exporting billions of euros and many of them find attractive to export capital undetected in order to not pay taxes on it; that's why they may like bitcoins. The only difficulty might be finding someone in Switzerland or wherever they want to export their money available to exchange their bitcoin for cash in person at a decent rate, assuming that they do not want use exchange agencies. I do not think that many of them would be ready to use confidently the OTC market (which is too mostly dependent on bank transactions).

Or, maybe they'll look at bitcoin and like it better for it's monetary properties than fiat and just KEEP THEM In that case all that's needed is some guy selling bitcoin for EUR in greece. This guy would face the same problem then, however, right? So I don't think this can work.