This feels kinda like a pump and dump to me. I don't mind articles/projects/sites that make use of bitcoins. But the frequency of posts on how much each bitcoin is worth feels like pennystocks/etc on an investing forum. People trying to get more people to buy in. To drive it up. So they can get out while it's high.
The whole "Cyprus people are getting into Bitcoin" narrative is a total lie as well. But I guess Bitcoin is a great learning opportunity for spotting Scams etc., as long as people don't lose too much money, it might even be beneficial.
Actually for me bitcoin proves just how few people can ACTUALLY spot a pyramid scheme or a pump and dump - instead resorting to calling everything that seems too good to be true a scam. It may work 99.9% of the time, but BTC is the false positive IMO.
I totally agree that the Cyprus thing is totally bogus though, journalists are uninformed and lazy as usual. The real reason is that it seems more and more likely that bitcoin will be the currency of the Internet in the future. And nothing else.
The fact that Bitcoin is touted as an alternative to untrustworthy -- because inflationary -- traditional currencies, while its exchange rate staggers around like an ice-skating drunk compared to those same traditional currencies, does not fill me with confidence.
"The real reason" for the current price hike is most likely http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=bitcoin
meaning we are back in a super high interest in bitcoin phase. Maybe because that is because the world just realized the "currency of the Internet" thing, or it is just a hype, fueled by a lot of misleading promotion and lies. No use to discuss it though, we all will learn in 6+ months...
That's a misunderstanding of history. USD used to be backed by silver and all bills said "in silver payable to the bearer on demand". It was only relatively recently that the practice ended.
It doesn't really invalidate his statement though. The USD is not backed by anything (whether it was in the past or not is irrelevant), and aside from the fact that it's commonly accepted, has no more intrinsic value than Bitcoin.
As long as 300 million people are required to convert a fraction of their income to USD for taxes, its value can't go to zero. Bitcoin's value is purely an article of faith so far.
While I'd like to believe you, a link to the "Cyprus lie" would be nice. :-)
I don't think "core bitcoin" users are scamming anyone. But at this point, the speed at which BTC has grown has triggered my "manipulation trigger". A decentralized currency is prone to manipulation... its not like there is an FCC out there to stop people from manipulating BTC.
That's incredibly stupid. They present no evidence, and here's the quote they lead with:
> “If I was looking for a store of value, I'd buy gold, wouldn't I?” Edward Castronova, a professor of telecommunications, and an expert on virtual worlds and currencies, told Ars. “It's a hell of a lot safer than Bitcoin.”
Castronova, have you ever heard of things like 'margins' or 'fungibility' or 'walking and chewing bubblegum'? You know, people can buy both bitcoins and gold - shocking as this may seem. The question is not 'are people physically on the island of Cyprus who would be buying gold instead buying bitcoins?', the question is 'on the margin, are people worldwide buying bitcoins because of Cyprus?'
Nor is pointing out the recent rise an objection. The rise over the past months to $30 was relatively slow and gradual. The rise to $50 and then $105 has been meteoric and directly correlates with the sudden Cyprus crisis. Bitcoin literally started with criticism of bank failures and bailouts (check out the first block, by Nakamoto, in the blockchain) and immunity to this sort of shit is one of its main selling points. The burden of proof is on anyone who thinks that Bitcoin has suddenly just sorta accidentally tripled for no reason at all relating to Cyprus.
>Why would anyone trust an electronic form of money that could get hacked and then diluted into oblivion?" Michael Pento, president of Pento Portfolio Strategies, told CNBC.
All currencies are prone to manipulation. Spend a couple of months trading forex (even on paper) if you don't believe me. The columes involved in forex trading (last I looked something like 3 or 4 trillion USD/day equivalent) are way beyond the capacities of /any/ central bank to "manage" or manipulate in their own favour, and it's an over-the-counter trading system, so mostly-impossible to regulate.
You said the forex market is prone to manipulation and then said that it's way beyond the capacities of any central bank to manipulate. So which is it?
So who and when is going to get out? And out where? To fiat currency that is controlled, inspected, can be frozen, taxed and stolen? Bitcoin grows like crazy because it is a money proved to work. It survived exchange hacks, stolen wallets, viruses, user mistakes, network-affecting software bugs and government seizures of bank deposits. It allows you to hold something in your pocket that nobody knows about and you can split it in 100 pieces and send to 100 people in different countries in a matter of seconds.
Bitcoin is not a promise of future delivery. Like William Gibson said, "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed."
"Bitcoin grows like crazy because it is a money proved to work."
Bitcoin grows like crazy thanks to various entities of increasing credibility building an ecosystem around BTC. Like Coinbase, which I'm sure is why a lot of people here got into bitcoin.
Kind of a ridiculous comment. I would buy groceries for someone and deliver them if they gave me 1 Bitcoin. I would also hand them my homegrown vegetables for a Bitcoin.
