Bill Gates 3 problems with BTC

[Brewins]

He probably owns 100K btc for kicks

you can't just buy 100k BTC without creating a big noise.

I doubt Gates has so many coins. Also considering that BTC taxes were a big not long ago

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[cbeast]

He probably owns 100K btc for kicks

you can't just buy 100k BTC without creating a big noise.

I doubt Gates has so many coins. Also considering that BTC taxes were a big not long ago

He can claim secrecy on his SEC 13F form for his Cascades Investments, The Bill and Melinda Foundation, or any of his other investment ventures.

[alkdf]

Poor people cannot currently rely on bitcoin

“The effort to make sure your bitcoin provider isn’t going to lose your money and your understanding of the volatility of bitcoin — I’d hardly say that it’s ready for, you know, poor people to have it go up and down by a factor of two and, you know — ‘Oops, I was at Mt. Gox. Now that’s not good. Now I’m at Bit-whatever.’”

Lack of transaction reversals

“So that basic technology shows that digital can do these things very cheaply, and the fees that have been building up over time won’t stand up even for small transactions. Now making sure that the thing is fraud-resistant and that money can be refunded – there’s somebody that you call up if you think you transferred to the wrong account or your account balance is not what you’d expect.”

Potential Anonymity

“Also governments, for most transactions, will want attribution, that is, the idea of a system where you can’t see — is that drug money, is it terrorist money? Should that be taxed? You’re going to have some tension between the attributed systems like credit card [or] debit card systems where there’s actually a record of who’s engaging and the purely anonymous ones. The one where I see it getting to critical mass, along with the government regulatory support we need is where it’s attributed; where we can see who actually did this transaction.”

http://insidebitcoins.com/news/bill-gates-3-criticisms-of-bitcoin

The last one isn't a problem for me but the first two are. The bigger problem is having no incentive to adopt BTC for ordinary people.

If you watch the way the question was set up he was basically asked if Bitcoin was not in fact the panacea today solution to all of the unbanked in Africa's problems. Of course it isn't today. And he has said positive things about it in the past he's probably just sick of the hype.

[nextgencoin]

If Bill gates was really interested in poverty issues in Africa you would think a way for Africans to use their cellphones to bank would be essential. Africans are already very savvy with older mobile payments and I was watching a BBC report that now smartphone use using very cheap African handsets are now exploding in popularity. Bitcoin could raise Africa out of poverty if they as nations get onboard with Bitcoin as a continent early. As the Wests wealth collapses with the Dollar and Euro Arica would be in a good position if they adopt wholesale Bitcoin now!

[mlferro]

He probably owns 100K btc for kicks

you can't just buy 100k BTC without creating a big noise.

I doubt Gates has so many coins. Also considering that BTC taxes were a big not long ago

He can claim secrecy on his SEC 13F form for his Cascades Investments, The Bill and Melinda Foundation, or any of his other investment ventures.

Even with that, I do not believe he has that amount of bitcoins

[Wendigo]

Imagine if Microsoft integrate bitcoin into Windows 10 store for microtransactions. Wouldn't that be a big hit?

[cbeast]

He probably owns 100K btc for kicks

you can't just buy 100k BTC without creating a big noise.

I doubt Gates has so many coins. Also considering that BTC taxes were a big not long ago

He can claim secrecy on his SEC 13F form for his Cascades Investments, The Bill and Melinda Foundation, or any of his other investment ventures.

Even with that, I do not believe he has that amount of bitcoins

He knew about them when they were cheap like the Winklevii did.

[Agestorzrxx]

The second one is the advantage of bitcoin.

[muhrohmat]

bill gates foundation has 600 billion dollars he personal owns 35 million per day in retirement soo i mean he is gonna buy btc for what like 300.000 BTC per day for the income and risk losing the btc for less value i dont think he need speedy trasactions and personal passes for bank btc wallet but its just me he might have yes like 100k just for fun and may even give his sons but thats his problem my problem is depper i do need every coin not like him

[BitCoinNutJob]

Bills gates is all over Bitcoin's nutsack lately, just join us and pump the bitcoin bill.

[Eastwind]

Lack of transaction reversals

“So that basic technology shows that digital can do these things very cheaply, and the fees that have been building up over time won’t stand up even for small transactions. Now making sure that the thing is fraud-resistant and that money can be refunded – there’s somebody that you call up if you think you transferred to the wrong account or your account balance is not what you’d expect.”

If you use paypal with BTC, then the transaction can be reversed. Paypal acts as escrow. Paypal can be replaced by other third parties.

[Bitcoinexp]

The one i agree on most is the 2nd problem. If certain transactions could be reversed, typically relating to shady activities(ponzies, scams etc), bitcoins would be a lot more user-friendly. The only way i see a solution for the 1st problem is to have bitcoin's price fluctuation controlled. The only plausible way? Partially isolate the currency from other fiat currencies and place a determined price system. Don't see that happening... would be too close to having a centralized currency...

[gjgjg]

Well bill,  i used visa via paypal to buy something 2 years ago and I'm still looking for a refund (going through the courts). Sure, it's possible to be absent minded enough to send btc to the wrong address but in the future we won't be scanning qr codes bit sending via fb profiles and phone numbers (which might actually be more problematic for some).

Anyway, gates isn't involved with ms much anymore. The new guy sees the light ;p

[BittBurger]

I can see why the 1 and 2 are bad but the 3 is ludicrous.

The problem is that he's comparing Bitcoin's anonymity to Visa and Mastercard's documentation system.  He's supposed to be comparing Bitcoin to cash. 

Its going to take awhile (years) for the general public and regulators to recognize that Bitcoin needs to be viewed as cash. 

The fact that its so new, and its a technology, etc etc etc makes them immediately want it to be different than cash, and compare it to systems that it shouldn't be compared to.

People on these types of panels just need to repeat over and over:  "If I hand you a dollar bill, there is no record of that anywhere, for taxes, terrorism, or otherwise".

This needs to become a very pervasive response, so people start getting it in their heads. 

Ultimately I truly believe the consumer public is going to start seeing the benefits of Bitcoin for online purchases.  The fact that their card can't be stolen.  The fact that they dont have to put up with the bullshit Banks put them through (they closed one of my business accounts last week because I wasn't using it "enough").  The freedom to handle your own money without permission from a bank is going to be huge I think, once people start to realize it.  Everyone's pissed off at their bank.  Everyone would pull their money out of there if they could, if there was a better solution that gave them more control.

All of these things need to become part of the public discussion so consumers start to recognize there are benefits to Bitcoin outside of "overthrowing the state". 

-B-

[el kaka22]

it is never too late gate's
anyway
if big companies accept bitcoin whether bitcoin prices will go up?

[cafucafucafu]

The one i agree on most is the 2nd problem. If certain transactions could be reversed, typically relating to shady activities(ponzies, scams etc), bitcoins would be a lot more user-friendly.

Or have bank/paypal type companies for bicton for those who want to use them. I.e. those companies will compensate the payer. Also the law will deal with such matters. I.e. go to jail for not giving a refund. Just like how these problems were solved with cash.

[runpaint]

#1, poor people can use it just like they use any money.  They just use less of it.

Who is using mobile phone minutes as currency in Africa?  Was that the rich people?  Or is it the poor people, who Bill Gates assumes are too stupid to figure out digital currency?  Poor people are MORE likely to benefit from Bitcoin, around the world.

Poor people can't handle the risk, the volatility?  Who buys the majority of lottery tickets - is it rich people, or poor people?  Poor people already buy $10 worth of lottery tickets which might be worth $0.00 tomorrow, so they can certainly benefit by buying $10.00 worth of bitcoins which might be worth $5.00 tomorrow (and can function as perpetual lottery tickets, they can check their winnings every day without buying more every day).

#2, we don't need refunds and chargebacks.  If we give someone the power to take back any transaction we make, then that someone has complete control over our money and can take it whenever they decide.

#3, he's describing a problem for government overseers, not a problem for we the people.

His solution is to take the potential of Bitcoin and turn it into an Orwellian nightmare.  "Now with Bitcoin, people can monitor EVERY CENT YOU SPEND!  Isn't that wonderful?  They can already monitor everything you say, and now as an added bonus they will know what you buy as soon as you buy it!  Just trust them, they won't abuse the power like those other times."  

Give complete trust to the government over every aspect of our lives, that's what Bill Gates thinks cryptocurrency is for.

[ArticMine]

Before commenting  on this it is critical to listen to the whole interview. http://insidebitcoins.com/news/bill-gates-3-criticisms-of-bitcoin The interviewer does an excellent job of asking the tough questions and Bill Gates attempts but in reality fails to "doge the bullets".  The first of course is when the interviewer effectively pins down Bill Gates into supporting GMOs. The real bullet he has to doge is when the interviewer reminded Bill Gates how he benefited from open systems to develop as a coder, and how many systems today are closed. No mention of the dreaded G (GNU) and L (Linux) words but the message is loud and clear. Bill Gates avoids the issue by shifting the focus to basic literacy rather than coding skills. My take is that he knows that many of the answers are to ditch propriety solutions but of course will not admit to that.

Poor people cannot currently rely on bitcoin

“The effort to make sure your bitcoin provider isn’t going to lose your money and your understanding of the volatility of bitcoin — I’d hardly say that it’s ready for, you know, poor people to have it go up and down by a factor of two and, you know — ‘Oops, I was at Mt. Gox. Now that’s not good. Now I’m at Bit-whatever.’”

He is wrong on both counts here. First on the volatility issue there are many situations where the the fees associated with a propriety transaction outweigh the volatility risk even for the homeless. http://www.wired.com/2013/09/bitcoin-homeless/all/. The issue of the provider risk misses the entire point of Bitcoin. The solution is to not rely on a provider but instead store the XBT on a device that one trusts. This of course brings up the issue of malware, in order to prevent the theft of the XBT. The solution to the malware issue is of course very simple. Ditch Windows and run GNU/LInux instead. Now does anyone really expect Bill Gates to admit to that!

Lack of transaction reversals

“So that basic technology shows that digital can do these things very cheaply, and the fees that have been building up over time won’t stand up even for small transactions. Now making sure that the thing is fraud-resistant and that money can be refunded – there’s somebody that you call up if you think you transferred to the wrong account or your account balance is not what you’d expect.”

He is wrong again. The problem with this argument is that it only works if the payee has good credit in order to honour the reversal. There is a reason why one of the requirements or of a Merchant account of a PayPal account is a good credit rating. Now if the real objective here is to address poverty a payment system that relies on the payee having good credit makes absolutely no sense since in many cases poor people have no credit or bad credit. After all if it is difficult or impossible to make payments to poor people how on earth can one expect such a payment system to help reduce poverty!

Potential Anonymity

“Also governments, for most transactions, will want attribution, that is, the idea of a system where you can’t see — is that drug money, is it terrorist money? Should that be taxed? You’re going to have some tension between the attributed systems like credit card [or] debit card systems where there’s actually a record of who’s engaging and the purely anonymous ones. The one where I see it getting to critical mass, along with the government regulatory support we need is where it’s attributed; where we can see who actually did this transaction.”

He is wrong again. The issue here is cost vs return pure and simple. The cost of doing AML/KNC on a prospective client is close to the same regardless of the net worth of the client. This net worth can be 0.60 USD or 60,000,000,000.00 USD. The difference in the profit potential for the institution doing the AML/KNC differs by 11 orders of magnitude. For this reason the only digital money transfer systems that actually work and are cost effective for the poor are those that do not have or effectively do not have attribution.

[btcrich]

Exactly. You could optionally select to use some kind of 3rd party escrow type entity in a bitcoin transaction if you wanted to. It just isn't mandatory. It's one of those higher level layers that CAN be programmed on top of the Bitcoin network. So even that is a POSSIBILITY.

Exactly, and that way there is a much lower chance of problems such as paypal reversals. Someone can choose to have escrow or not which makes it their responsibility.

I hope Bill Gates sees this sooner rather than later. Because he can make big decisions that can move industries. If he gets it then he can assist it.

+1

Instead of saying "hey, you know nothing about Bitcoin, gtfo", it might be better to write him, welcome him to the Bitcoin community, and let him know that there are or could be solutions to the issues he sees with Bitcoin.

He seems to be taking a level headed approach with the, perhaps limited, information he has.  It's great to see someone with his profile so interested in the technology.

[btcshiner]

It will be interesting to see if Bill Gates or an organization he is attached to funds a business based on BTC or dare i say comes out with it's own coin....

Either way I think it is good for BTC that he is talking about it.