Lost Bitcoin Recovery

[||bit]

There will be a maximum number of bitcoins discovered. Bitcoins can be lost. I realize they can be divided to so many decimal places, but disregarding how long this would take to become a problem. Assume it is.

What of the idea to "re-encrypt" (for lack of better term) any bitcoins that have shown to be inactive in all ways for something like ten years. In other words, people would have to at least relocate their bitcoins to another of their wallets accounts or spend them within ten years for them to remain in the economy. Otherwise, they could be assumed lost coins, and buried again to be re-mined (like finding some lost gold on the beach). Or re-distributed to all active wallets

Late entry: This solution could possibly be implemented when/if it does become a problem, I'd guess. But should the community have to wait to see when this happens?

[drakahn]

And what of the bitcoins i put on a flashdriver/paper wallet and put into a time capsule?

whats the point of having a store of value without being able to store value?

[Blazr]

When Bitcoins get lost it increases the value of every other Bitcoin as the supply has decreased.

There is no real reason to bring back lost coins. What if I want to leave an inheritance in BTC for my family? I'd have to keep moving it around every 10 years otherwise I'd lose it with your proposal.

[||bit]

And what of the bitcoins i put on a flashdriver/paper wallet and put into a time capsule?

whats the point of having a store of value without being able to store value?

Minor inconvenience. The value is still there, you'd just have to log onto your flash drive once every ten years (maybe twenty) and just shift the bitcoins to another account in the same wallet on the same flash drive.

But assume the decaying number of bitcoins is real problem. Then your bitcoins may be so rare as to be useless as a currency. Granted, that may not happen in our lifetimes.

[Blazr]

But assume the decaying number of bitcoins is real problem. Then your bitcoins may be so rare as to be useless as a currency. Granted, that may not happen in our lifetimes.

Lets say we loose so many Bitcoins that now 0.00000001BTC (1 satoshi) is worth $1. No problem, all we have to do is add a couple of extra 0's (small change in client software) and were sorted, we'll just price everything in Satoshi's. I don't see how this could make it useless as a currency.

[||bit]

When Bitcoins get lost it increases the value of every other Bitcoin as the supply has decreased.

There is no real reason to bring back lost coins. What if I want to leave an inheritance in BTC for my family? I'd have to keep moving it around every 10 years otherwise I'd lose it with your proposal.

The reason to bring them back would be to keep the money supply viable. I'd rather do that than to take benefit of increasing my BTC value b/c others lost a bad flash drive or something silly like that to which we are all subceptible.

It's not a proposed solution I'm stuck on. Just hashing the idea out to look ahead and solve it. Anyway, make it twenty years if ten years is too soon.   Takes just a few clicks per twenty years. If you forget to do it in that period of time, maybe you already effectively lost them.

Another thought might be to peg BTC to gold, and then increase the money supply after the last bitcoin is mined. Just brain storming.

[Raoul Duke]

This thread is like menstruation. Usually comes every month lol

Why don't people learn to how use the search?

[drakahn]

And again, a store of value that is useless at storing value is... well useless

if i have bitcoins on a paper wallet that i leave amongst my possessions, my great grandkids should be able to use it in 100 years, there is no way to tell the difference between stored and lost, so this would never work.

[||bit]

But assume the decaying number of bitcoins is real problem. Then your bitcoins may be so rare as to be useless as a currency. Granted, that may not happen in our lifetimes.

Lets say we loose so many Bitcoins that now 0.00000001BTC (1 satoshi) is worth $1. No problem, all we have to do is add a couple of extra 0's (small change in client software) and were sorted, we'll just price everything in Satoshi's. I don't see how this could make it useless as a currency.

How many Satoshi's are there? 21*10^14 ... 2,100,000,000,000,000 ... Something like that. A lot I know. With the current world population at about 7,000,000,000. So, maybe 300,000 Satoshi's per person? Care to verify for me?

In that case It shouldn't be a problem anytime soon like I said before. But a hundred years down the road, how many BTC will be lost? Flash drives die very easily. And in these days, if they die, they take out several BTC's, not the very tiny Satoshi's.

[drakahn]

we can add as many decimal places as we want..... 16 would be easy

[Blazr]

we can add as many decimal places as we want..... 16 would be easy

Yep, when Bitcoins were at $20 in July, there were plans to add another decimal place in case the value increased any further. It's literally a line of code change and shouldn't have that much of an impact.

[||bit]

This thread is like menstruation. Usually comes every month lol

Why don't people learn to how use the search?

I know how to search, but chose not to. Thanks anyway.

BTW: How many times would the topic of menstruation appear if I did a search?

[||bit]

we can add as many decimal places as we want..... 16 would be easy

Sorry, I was always under the impression that it was more fixed. That seems like a viable fix or workaround.

Perhaps, the best thing to do for now is to store them to reduce risk of loss. For example, If you used a flashdrive for storage, I would personally not do that. They seem to go bad easier than I'd want to risk with any significant amount of BTC.

[||bit]

we can add as many decimal places as we want..... 16 would be easy

Yep, when Bitcoins were at $20 in July, there were plans to add another decimal place in case the value increased any further. It's literally a line of code change and shouldn't have that much of an impact.

Code in the client software?

[Blazr]

Code in the client software?

From what I understand, yes, like BIP16 or any of those, its a small 1 line change in the various client's.

[Raoul Duke]

This thread is like menstruation. Usually comes every month lol

Why don't people learn to how use the search?

I know how to search, but chose not to. Thanks anyway.

BTW: How many times would the topic of menstruation appear if I did a search?

Don't act stupid. This topic has been discussed to death.
If you chose not to search it, then you're just trying to spam your FUD.

[Stephen Gornick]

but disregarding how long this would take to become a problem. Assume it is.

What I can't seem to get from anyone who expresses lost coins as being a problem is the reason as to why that is a problem?

Yes, there will some point that more coins will be destroyed than there are issued.  Yes, that will contribute to price deflation.

Is that the "problem" that comes as the result of lost coins? 

Or am I missing something?

[dree12]

but disregarding how long this would take to become a problem. Assume it is.

What I can't seem to get from anyone who expresses lost coins as being a problem is the reason as to why that is a problem?

Yes, there will some point that more coins will be destroyed than there are issued.  Yes, that will contribute to price deflation.

Is that the "problem" that comes as the result of lost coins?  

Or am I missing something?

The decrease of granularity is often cited to be the problem. As we all know, Bitcoin does not have a sufficient number of decimal places to allow microtransactions if it is commonly used (2100000000000000/7000000000=300000 average/person) even when no coins are lost. With a large amount of lost coins, this becomes a even larger problem, as merchants would eventually be forced to price items in sub-satoshis, only payable through a) debt, or b) a centralized service. These are generally considered problems.

My suggestion has always been to increase the decimal points now, to at least 12 and even better, 16. This will ensure no chain fork will be needed when Bitcoin reaches critical mass.

Note: I am aware that this is a simplified model. If Bitcoin reaches critical mass, it is highly likely the effective number of Bitcoins will exceed twenty-one million due to fractional reserve. However, as Bitcoin's goal is to offer one to avoid fractional reserve if that is ones choice, the granularity is still a concern.

[Vernon715]

I agree that this is a problem, and we should be thinking about this now, rather that later.

[Blazr]

I agree that this is a problem, and we should be thinking about this now, rather that later.

Please enlighten us how this is a problem, as mentioned we can keep adding decimals when the value if Bitcoins gets too high due to lost coins, therefore I can't see how this can become an issue.