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The Everything Bitcoin Thread


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The problem with bitcoin is that it isn't tangible. Sure you can "carry" it around in your e-wallets or whatever, but unlike stuff like silver, gold or real estate, there isn't really any intrinsic value attached to it.

Precious metals/stones has been valuable since the dawn of time and land is land.... but bitcoins... ummm... :unsure:

Even though I think that Bitcoin is a poor investment, you should look up the concept of "fiat money". Bitcoin is the same exact thing. The only difference is that Bitcoin isn't backed by or controlled by any one government.

Commodity based cash disappeared a long time ago. Gold and Silver are good long term investments because precious metals are a true tangible commodity that has always been and always will be sought after by people.

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Any currency that can take a hit from 1200 down to under 600 in a few weeks is no currency I want to get involved in. Have fun while it lasts but when it starts to fall apart it will happen very quickly.

P.S. How can you use a bitcoin to purchase a coffee if a bitcoin is worth $1000. Do they give $997 in cash as change?

It's volatile because there isn't a lot of volume right now. If you have 500 x 1 BTC buy orders from $900-1000/BTC and someone comes along and wants to sell off 525 BTC, it'll drop the price from 1000 to 900 in an instant. You can't do that with something like IBM stock because there is just so much more volume.

BTC are divisible to something like 8 or 9 decimal places. You'll pay 0.0052 BTC for your coffee.

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How is that different from the paper banknotes we use? Or the trillions of dollars that exist on computers?

Even though I think that Bitcoin is a poor investment, you should look up the concept of "fiat money". Bitcoin is the same exact thing. The only difference is that Bitcoin isn't backed by or controlled by any one government.

Commodity based cash disappeared a long time ago. Gold and Silver are good long term investments because precious metals are a true tangible commodity that has always been and always will be sought after by people.

I'm not a big fan of fiat money either, but at least the central banks that prints the money out (theoretically) have gold and stuff stored in a vault somewhere.

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I'm not a big fan of fiat money either, but at least the central banks that prints the money out (theoretically) have gold and stuff stored in a vault somewhere.

All of the gold, platinum, and silver in the world wouldn't even come close to backing up the amount of outstanding bank notes that even just the U.S. has in circulation. Then mix in the EU, England, European Union, Canada, etc. In today's world money only has value because governments say it does. If you ever take a University economics class, you'll be surprised on how the world's finances are set up. I know it freaked me out the first time I read about it. It's like a giant pyramid scheme. The only reason that the US is still solvent and can continue to borrow massive amounts of money is because of the enormity of its yearly GDP.

Edited by SabreFan1
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I remember reading an article about Germany wanting to see its gold stores in Fort Knox and the us basically coming up with a bunch of reasons why they couldn't. Lol. More likely the US sold it a long time ago.

Money backed up by precious metals ... How 1960s of you!!

Edited by TheAntar
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I remember reading an article about Germany wanting to see its gold stores in Fort Knox and the us basically coming up with a bunch of reasons why they couldn't. Lol. More likely the US sold it a long time ago.

Money backed up by precious metals ... How 1960s of you!!

It's still there. The U.S. government could sell it all and not even make a dent in the debt that it owes. Germany knows this as does every other country in the world. The story that you are thinking about must have taken place a number of decades ago. Before the world took itself off of the gold standard, you could take a US bank note (money) and trade it in for its equivalent in gold.

Many people in the world (including regular Americans) also believe that all of the US government debt is owed to foreign governments. That's not the case. A good chunk of that debt is internal. Social Security alone holds roughly 4 Trillion dollars in US government debt.

China and Japan are the biggest foreign debt holders. They hold U.S. debt notes totaling a bit over a Trillion dollars each.

I wish people would learn more about the world's economy. It's fascinating and scary all at once. It's a planet-wide house of cards just waiting to one day collapse.

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am i imagining things or are there people in this thread that actually supports investing into bitcoins?

Bitcoin is one of the dumbest thing anyone can make any serious investment into. The difference between Bitcoin and money in the bank is that the latter one is a permanent feature that any society needs.

The value of bitcoin is so easily manipulate that it's even more risky than the stock market.

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I'm not a big fan of fiat money either, but at least the central banks that prints the money out (theoretically) have gold and stuff stored in a vault somewhere.

The US federal reserve in NY and gold depository at Fort Knox combined have over 11,500 metric tons of gold on hand. A little more than Bitcoin. Bitcoin has only the people who believe in it and they can opt out anytime they wish.

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and bitcoins are the answer/better....

Read the whole thread. Almost everybody including myself thinks that investing in Bitcoins is foolish. I'm just trying to explain to people, in simplified terms, on how the world's economy in regards to the value of cash and its similarities to the theory behind Bitcoins. Read this Business Insider article and you'll see how easily Bitcoin can be manipulated at this point in time.

http://www.businessinsider.com/927-people-own-half-of-the-bitcoins-2013-12

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Read the whole thread. Almost everybody including myself thinks that investing in Bitcoins is foolish. I'm just trying to explain to people, in simplified terms, on how the world's economy in regards to the value of cash and its similarities to the theory behind Bitcoins. Read this Business Insider article and you'll see how easily Bitcoin can be manipulated at this point in time.

http://www.businessi...itcoins-2013-12

the difference is that Bitcoin doesn't have the restriction and rules that is applied to real world cash by the governments. But yes, I just can't understand why would some people invest so much money into the bitcoin market unless you are the one who's controlling it.... it's just foolish

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Although to be fair to Bitcoin, I remember when it first came out. Back then I always told people over the internet that it would always be worthless and that it would eventually be forgotten about and then abandoned. Whoops, my bad.

Don't worry, when Google bought Youtube I predicted that that would mark the fall of Youtube.

My bad.

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the difference is that Bitcoin doesn't have the restriction and rules that is applied to real world cash by the governments. But yes, I just can't understand why would some people invest so much money into the bitcoin market unless you are the one who's controlling it.... it's just foolish

Bitcoin is very limited by the fact that there is a very finite amount that will ever be available, but if other virtual currencies that have a much higher cap start taking off then you'll see governments start to regulate them. They are hesitant to do that now because of the uncertainty of the market. Virtual currencies are in their infancy. I just don't see it ever becoming more than a niche kind of currency.

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Don't worry, when Google bought Youtube I predicted that that would mark the fall of Youtube.

My bad.

If Google keeps going with these new and stupid video take-down rules then people are going to migrate to other services. Give your prediction a little time. They may still end up destroying it.

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