Is litecoin a good idea?

[mystery2048]

I am just wondering what your opinion is?

[grantbdev]

It better be because I'm mining them!

I think so. The differences between bitcoin are not adverse. Basically there is more of them and the transactions are faster. I think that over time it will help keep mining in equilibrium some how. I just wish there were more services/sites for litecoin, at least something equivalent to bitcoincharts.com.

[smoothie]

It better be because I'm mining them!

I think so. The differences between bitcoin are not adverse. Basically there is more of them and the transactions are faster. I think that over time it will help keep mining in equilibrium some how. I just wish there were more services/sites for litecoin, at least something equivalent to bitcoincharts.com.

So ....more "services" to support speculation? LOL

[unclescrooge]

What gives money value?

If you accept money against your work, it's because you're sure that someone else will, later, accept your money for his work. So the more people use a money, the more valuable this money is. That's why, throughout history, silver and especially gold have been the universal currencies, the most valuable ones. Even if there is platinum or other precious metal out there. The only reason we have local currencies is because local governments impose them.

OK what's my point? My point is, even if litecoin was a little better than bitcoin, it will fail as a cryptocurrency. Because the one feature that people will seek in a cryptocurrency is its intrinsic value, ie how many people  use it.

And for those people who want to be the early adopters that will get rich with litecoin, don't worry, even with bitcoin you're still an early adopter

[Come-from-Beyond]

I am just wondering what your opinion is?

Our society needs a cryptocoin and we shouldn't rely completely on Bitcoin. Litecoin "backups" Bitcoin's functionality, so it's a realy good idea.

[coin_toss]

Litecoin is a good idea. I support it for the same reasons i support bitcoin. All it needs is a strong mining network holding it up, and obviously some more services, and I can see it being very successful and useful to this community. Providing an alternative application for GPU's is one such use, but there are many others.

[cbeast]

It seems that LTC is hardware dependent on a CPU and memory. It is also expensive in electricity. If LTC were to reach a large audience, it would not be able to keep up with the transaction verification because there is no incentive to run CPUs to support the network.

[str4wm4n]

obviously it is 

[Dargo]

Out of the alternatives to BTC, LTC maybe has the best shot, but that's not saying a whole lot. Once ASICs arrive, I may give LTC mining a go with my GPU rigs and see if it catches on. If enough people do the same, it might actually catch on.

[VelvetLeaf]

Out of the alternatives to BTC, LTC maybe has the best shot, but that's not saying a whole lot. Once ASICs arrive, I may give LTC mining a go with my GPU rigs and see if it catches on. If enough people do the same, it might actually catch on.

Won't that be too late if you switch at October ?
You won't get as many litecoin if you mine it later, as difficulty keep increasing every few days.
After GPUs users move in, difficulty changed from 1 to 6.6 now.
Imagine the difficulty change in October if most of GPU user move to litecoin.

The total Litecoin network is ~200 MH/s, since scrypt is 1/1000's bitcoin speed, that is equal to 200 GH/s or 0.2 TH/s in bitcoin world.
Total bitcoin network now is 13.3 TH/s.
So roughly only 1.5% hash power move from bitcoin to litecoin now.

Let's say that 30% of 13.3 TH/s is from GPU user, and only 65% will move to litecoin because it's not feasible anymore to mine bitcoin.
30% * 13.3 * 65% = 2.5935 TH/s
After applying 1/1000 multiplier, that's equal to 2.5935 GH/s

Current litecoin network is 0.2 GH/s
If the network speed grows from 0.2 to 2.7 GH/s, the difficulty won't be 6 anymore and less coin will be generated per kH/s.

[grantbdev]

What gives money value?

If you accept money against your work, it's because you're sure that someone else will, later, accept your money for his work. So the more people use a money, the more valuable this money is. That's why, throughout history, silver and especially gold have been the universal currencies, the most valuable ones. Even if there is platinum or other precious metal out there. The only reason we have local currencies is because local governments impose them.

OK what's my point? My point is, even if litecoin was a little better than bitcoin, it will fail as a cryptocurrency. Because the one feature that people will seek in a cryptocurrency is its intrinsic value, ie how many people  use it.

And for those people who want to be the early adopters that will get rich with litecoin, don't worry, even with bitcoin you're still an early adopter

Nothing you said rules out litecoin. It's not about being better than bitcoin, it's just an alternative. It's still relatively new and has plenty of time to grow.

[Dargo]

Out of the alternatives to BTC, LTC maybe has the best shot, but that's not saying a whole lot. Once ASICs arrive, I may give LTC mining a go with my GPU rigs and see if it catches on. If enough people do the same, it might actually catch on.

Won't that be too late if you switch at October ?
You won't get as many litecoin if you mine it later, as difficulty keep increasing every few days.
After GPUs users move in, difficulty changed from 1 to 6.6 now.
Imagine the difficulty change in October if most of GPU user move to litecoin.

The total Litecoin network is ~200 MH/s, since scrypt is 1/1000's bitcoin speed, that is equal to 200 GH/s or 0.2 TH/s in bitcoin world.
Total bitcoin network now is 13.3 TH/s.
So roughly only 1.5% hash power move from bitcoin to litecoin now.

Let's say that 30% of 13.3 TH/s is from GPU user, and only 65% will move to litecoin because it's not feasible anymore to mine bitcoin.
30% * 13.3 * 65% = 2.5935 TH/s
After applying 1/1000 multiplier, that's equal to 2.5935 GH/s

Current litecoin network is 0.2 GH/s
If the network speed grows from 0.2 to 2.7 GH/s, the difficulty won't be 6 anymore and less coin will be generated per kH/s.

I think it's an interesting strategy to mine LTC now rather than waiting till October, and it could well be the most profitable one. But for me it also means that I stop mining BTC now (or at least mine less), and I don't want to do that. So I'm probably going to keep mining BTC until ASICs hit, then switch to LTC and see how it goes. But I may change my mind on this. For example, if we can raise the bounty and get a LTC version of CGminer

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=92887.0      <=====Shameless plug: please consider donating!

then I might start sooner rather than later.  

[disclaimer201]

Out of the alternatives to BTC, LTC maybe has the best shot, but that's not saying a whole lot. Once ASICs arrive, I may give LTC mining a go with my GPU rigs and see if it catches on. If enough people do the same, it might actually catch on.

Won't that be too late if you switch at October ?
You won't get as many litecoin if you mine it later, as difficulty keep increasing every few days.
After GPUs users move in, difficulty changed from 1 to 6.6 now.
Imagine the difficulty change in October if most of GPU user move to litecoin.

The total Litecoin network is ~200 MH/s, since scrypt is 1/1000's bitcoin speed, that is equal to 200 GH/s or 0.2 TH/s in bitcoin world.
Total bitcoin network now is 13.3 TH/s.
So roughly only 1.5% hash power move from bitcoin to litecoin now.

Let's say that 30% of 13.3 TH/s is from GPU user, and only 65% will move to litecoin because it's not feasible anymore to mine bitcoin.
30% * 13.3 * 65% = 2.5935 TH/s
After applying 1/1000 multiplier, that's equal to 2.5935 GH/s

Current litecoin network is 0.2 GH/s
If the network speed grows from 0.2 to 2.7 GH/s, the difficulty won't be 6 anymore and less coin will be generated per kH/s.

I think it's an interesting strategy to mine LTC now rather than waiting till October, and it could well be the most profitable one. But for me it also means that I stop mining BTC now (or at least mine less), and I don't want to do that. So I'm probably going to keep mining BTC until ASICs hit, then switch to LTC and see how it goes. But I may change my mind on this. For example, if we can raise the bounty and get a LTC version of CGminer

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=92887.0      <=====Shameless plug: please consider donating!

then I might start sooner rather than later.  

Don't even bother anymore. You are way too late already.

[sd]

I am just wondering what your opinion is?

No, it's not a good idea. It doesn't solve anything BitCoin hasn't already solved.

The often stated argument that it lets you buy small things faster appears to be nonsense. Merchants can sell cups of coffee or burgers without any confirms just like they now take cash without performing extensive analysis on each note. No-one is going to 51% attack BitCoin to steal a happy meal.

If LiteCoin is to be a success it has to not just compete with BitCoin but soundly beat it. The world doesn't need or want two basically identical cryptocurrencies.

[unclescrooge]

What gives money value?

If you accept money against your work, it's because you're sure that someone else will, later, accept your money for his work. So the more people use a money, the more valuable this money is. That's why, throughout history, silver and especially gold have been the universal currencies, the most valuable ones. Even if there is platinum or other precious metal out there. The only reason we have local currencies is because local governments impose them.

OK what's my point? My point is, even if litecoin was a little better than bitcoin, it will fail as a cryptocurrency. Because the one feature that people will seek in a cryptocurrency is its intrinsic value, ie how many people  use it.

And for those people who want to be the early adopters that will get rich with litecoin, don't worry, even with bitcoin you're still an early adopter

Nothing you said rules out litecoin..

Yes it does, that's kind of my whole point.

Do you know any popular auction website beside ebay? Neither do I. Because an auction website is a winner take it all "product". As is a currency, for the reasons I stated above.

I am just wondering what your opinion is?

No, it's not a good idea. It doesn't solve anything BitCoin hasn't already solved.

The often stated argument that it lets you buy small things faster appears to be nonsense. Merchants can sell cups of coffee or burgers without any confirms just like they now take cash without performing extensive analysis on each note. No-one is going to 51% attack BitCoin to steal a happy meal.

If LiteCoin is to be a success it has to not just compete with BitCoin but soundly beat it. The world doesn't need or want two basically identical cryptocurrencies.

+1

[disclaimer201]

Ooooooh, by the emotional response LTC gets in this thread I think it has already hit a nerve. Obviously people are so convinced of BTC that it won't hurt it to have some competition.

[cbeast]

Litecoin is the Christian rock of crypcoins. I'm sure there are people who believe in it, but just because you can doesn't mean you should.

[markm]

I am not sure what is up with LiTeCoins, my Open Transactions server has supported them for a long time already, with the ability to trade them directly for any other supported asset type, but there are no LiTeCoins in play there whatsoever. So from there LiteCoin seems more dead than NaMeCoin, I0Coin and IXCoin all of which have a thousand to twenty thousand or so of their coins on the server.

-MarkM-

[ThiagoCMC]

Litecoin can act as a backup of Bitcoin!  ;-)

[drrussellshane]

Litecoin is the Christian rock of crypcoins. I'm sure there are people who believe in it, but just because you can doesn't mean you should.

That's a fun way to put it! Haha.