The $1000 Bitcoin, yes it's worth at least that.

[berlin]

I think it is more useful to imagine bitcoin as an internet success, not a world revolution. If bitcoin were as successful as a facebook, or a twitter, widespread, ubiquitous, with apps on smart-phones and bitcoin addresses shown on billboards and so on. 21 billion dollars in bitcoin trade would make the 1000 dollar bitcoin about right I would say. I'm not sure how a 21 billion dollar bitcoin economy compares to something like facebook advertising and data-mining revenues annually. Perhas it would be necessary to talk in terms of estimated bitcoin GDP.

[unk]

'trade' isn't the right measure. if you're looking for fundamental value, it's how much value has been left in the system (used to acquire bitcoins and not 'withdrawn' for something else). the value of a bitcoin on that model comes from its claim against that systemic stored value, in the steady state.

you can never get more for your bitcoins than someone is willing to pay you for them. if every time someone buys a bitcoin with a dollar, someone else immediately cashes it out for a dollar, there is no net change in fundamental demand.

of course, prices in practice don't merely reflect 'fundamental' value because people try to estimate what such value will be in the future, leading to a 'beauty-contest game' or, at best, a rational prediction market in future value.

market capitalization, gross product, and so on are all very misleading in this context, except as very rough indicators of use.

[molecular]

Needless to say, this made me hot.

(looking at your profile picture)... Do you have a rather small head or is that not a cigarette?

[molecular]

please just be careful.

linkedin had an ipo today.  if i say 'if everyone on the planet got all their future jobs through linkedin, it would be worth $70,000 a share', that shouldn't make you want to buy it even slightly more.

anything can skyrocket. you still have to decide among all those possibilities where to put your money. a bitcoin in the current block chain isn't the first thing that has experienced exponential early price growth. as they say in america under the regulatory safe harbor, 'past performance does not predict future results'.

BTW, I'm selling tulips. BTC 30 each.

Wow almost as bad as my local garden center

mike was probably making a reference to the dutch tulip bubble of 1637 (http://www.damninteresting.com/the-dutch-tulip-bubble-of-1637), no?

[shackra]

For instance, a QR code of an encrypted version of your private key, printed on a piece of paper, even engraved on a sheet of metal, could easily survive an EMP. Bitcoin is far more durable than you think.

so, how i extract the private key of my wallet.dat to do that? :O

anyway, i´m a early early bitcoiner, i want bitcoins to buy things i.e: a coffe or a new computer part or donate it to some ONG (like the Free Software Fundation or the Electronic Fontrier Foundation). i dont feel my self like a greed person, the idea of get money without "work" is attractive, but if you think about it, the idea can be boring (no job? what i can do with my free time?).

anyway (again) the Bitcoin Free software need some improvement, everybody know that, and the e-commerces free software need it too (like a drupal e-commerce module with a bitcoin-accept feature).

i belive than we are making a change, if you talk to somebody and tell him about the bitcoins and it´s aventages or the easy how is to buy things in amazon with bitcoins (idea: buy a birthday gift to he/her with bitcoins only!!), this is a slow walk to a best future, IMO.

the other thing is, the bitcoin market looks like make it for northamericans or Europeans only, i wish than buy-sell bitcoins/products get easier for centralamerican people like me! .

[MoonShadow]

the other thing is, the bitcoin market looks like make it for northamericans or Europeans only, i wish than buy-sell bitcoins/products get easier for centralamerican people like me! .

Seems to me that Brazilians have beaten you to the party, but if you want more products from CA or SA, then start selling them!  Depending on where you are, consider selling handmade hammocks.  The kind without spreaders.  I've bought them myself from an importer on Ebay, and I love them.

[Timo Y]

I think it is more useful to imagine bitcoin as an internet success, not a world revolution. If bitcoin were as successful as a facebook, or a twitter, widespread, ubiquitous, with apps on smart-phones and bitcoin addresses shown on billboards and so on. 21 billion dollars in bitcoin trade would make the 1000 dollar bitcoin about right I would say. I'm not sure how a 21 billion dollar bitcoin economy compares to something like facebook advertising and data-mining revenues annually. Perhas it would be necessary to talk in terms of estimated bitcoin GDP.

Facebook/Twitter is little more than a fun toy for most users. Bitcoin is potentially way more useful and serious than that. It takes the internet to the next level.

I'm not saying that Bitcoin will ever have as many users as Facebook, but if it does, market capitalisation will be orders of magnitude higher than Facebook's.

 

[evoorhees]

Currency backed by gold, not an illusion.

what can you do with gold that you cannot do with bitcoins?
it has value because is rare, period
can be used in manufacturing of some electronic components, but it is not only option... ~90% (?) of its value come from limited supply not from any kind of actual usefulness
same with diamonds

Gold does not have value "because it is rare, period." There are many rare things - for example a blue cactus is rare, why has it not become the foundation of the global monetary system?  Gold is valuable in part because it is rare, but rarity alone is not a sufficient condition for value.

The real reason gold is valuable is because it has a unique set of characteristics that make it effective as a money (and there are wonderful parallels to Bitcoin in this regard). This piece explains it: http://bit.ly/dk0VzY

Similarly, Bitcoin's value comes only in part from its rarity - but the larger part of value is its effectiveness as money due to its characteristics (secure, private, decentralized, diminishing rate of inflation, etc.)

[mikegogulski]

mike was probably making a reference to the dutch tulip bubble of 1637 (http://www.damninteresting.com/the-dutch-tulip-bubble-of-1637), no?

Indeed.

[m4rkiz]

Currency backed by gold, not an illusion.

what can you do with gold that you cannot do with bitcoins?
it has value because is rare, period
can be used in manufacturing of some electronic components, but it is not only option... ~90% (?) of its value come from limited supply not from any kind of actual usefulness
same with diamonds

Gold does not have value "because it is rare, period." There are many rare things - for example a blue cactus is rare, why has it not become the foundation of the global monetary system? 

because it is not practical having plant as currency, and you can grow many of them for almost free which is deal breaker

[brocktice]

BTW, I'm selling tulips. BTC 30 each.

Wow almost as bad as my local garden center

mike was probably making a reference to the dutch tulip bubble of 1637 (http://www.damninteresting.com/the-dutch-tulip-bubble-of-1637), no?

Yes, I know. Unfortunately I've seen quite a few people mistakenly compare bitcoins to tulips.

[freedomno1]

Well this is a bit necro but it makes an interesting point this forum was discussing this when bitcoins were 8 dollars now their much higher than at that time so who knows how far the bitcoin will go

[Herbalconfusion]

valid necro is valid. OP is almost prophetic.

[tclo]

It is worth what people are willing to pay for it right now...no more and no less.  So you think it is "really" worth $1000 when everyone else thinks it is worth $64 ?  

Ok nothing wrong with living in your fantasy land but you have to open to people pointing this out on occasion, which is what I'm doing here.  

BTC is worth $64.58 and the moment and it will see $30 before it sees $300.  Of course in a few years, we could see the collapse of a major currency and another BTC bubble could form, but that is a different subject.  That is then and this is now and BTC is not worth $1000...not remotely close to it.

[jubalix]

1) Not enough market. At some point, investors star to realize that Bitcoin is only a speculative tool and that there are very few websites using it for real.

At some point, some of Bitcoin's market segments WILL experience a loss of confidence. This could happen gradually, leading to a tapering-off of Bitcoin's price growth, or it could happen suddenly, leading to a big drop. No-one should be surprised when this happens. it will happen at least once. Personally I think we're a long way from when it will happen.

I think the short-term risks are:

1. A serious problem at MtGox (e.g. an outage lasting a week or more), which would dent the credibility of Bitcoin in a big way. Not for existing users, but for anyone considering getting into Bitcoin. This would depress the price in a big way.

2. A serious attempt by the government to stifle Bitcoin. Or even just a credible statement of desire to stifle Bitcoin.

This guy [1] prophetic

[kalinka]

I'll sell you my .06 bitcoins I have left for $1000/coin. Deal?

[yocko06]

When you can see a future value on something you buy it before it hit's that price. future value of bitcoin  mathematically is much more than $1000. so you would buy bitcoins now for a bargain and sit on your investment in the software for 6 to 12 months. It's going to be funny when all these haters who where saying bitcoin is worth nothing are down in the history books as the guys who failed badly. People where saying the same stuff to me at $0.70 and now they don't say a word. the whole way they have said it's to late to buy now $5. to late $10. to late $30. to late lol
$1000 to late 

[DastanX]

someday someday

[rat]

I think that we should try to concentrate on pessimistic scenarios instead. What could lead Bitcoin to a crash:

1) Not enough market. At some point, investors star to realize that Bitcoin is only a speculative tool and that there are very few websites using it for real. They sell, the bubble crashes. I think that this scenario is very unlikely as all we have to do to avoid that is to make more and more businesses accepting bitcoin.


2) A security flaw in the software. A small security concern might drive the prices down but a huge flaw might be the death of Bitcoin. I think that, the more the time passes, the less likely it is to happen. Indeed, with the price increase, there is more and more incentive to crack the system.


3) Another e-currency appears and offer everything bitcoin has to offer without the drawbacks. That's the real danger I see for bitcoin now. Bitcoin could be the Napster or the Betamax of E-money. The biggest flaw in Bitcoin right now is that it is not user friendly. Addresses are painful to use, the software is ugly (UI looks like a win95 UI), the need for backup of wallet.dat makes it dangerous to use, there's no way to send a message with you payment (which is something you want in most case), there's no way to send a payment to someone you know without asking for a bitcoin address first.

All of those problems can be solved "easily", with online banks and an e-banking protocol on top of Bitcoin. But it remains to be done and, as long as it is not done, someone else could take the lead.

everything this guy said.

[zakoliverz]

$1000 a coin... is it's too much for a neraly future...

quite interesting look at the prices now.