OT: Bitcoin offers solution to global currency problems.

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No. Monstrous inflation! Only a very small and limited number of bit coi= ns =

and a large and growing group of people wanting them. One of the early =

adopters (2010) bought 2 pizzas with 10000 bit coins. Old write ups of t= he =

event say he paid the equivalent of $50000, then $75000 and at the price= 6 =

days ago $4-million. Thats $25 worth of food (the original cost) now =

equaling$4 million thats 2000% pa.

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That's my expectation (though there may be more dirty business than just producing a competitor). It would have to get bigger by many orders of magnitude before it would be too big to fail, and I suspect it will be either slapped down or there will be an "embrace, extend and extinguish" strategy brought into play.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Bitcoins are minted at a pre-determined rate per unit time, (10 minutes) so working harder will will not increase the supply. it will only your share of that supply.

Yes, assuming it survives and all. Most likely the Gum'mint is going to slap it down in the next few years. Maybe someone will come out with another, but there will probably be enough chilling effects in place by then to minimize adoption (i.e., it won't become a 'thing' like BC is now).

Government being what it is, actual implementation of a legitimate electronic currency would take a few decades, and require coordination with the credit card companies (because, whose else's palms are they going to grease?), and various back alley deals in finance and industry that will come to light yet make little difference to the outcome (at least, that's how things seem to work today).

Tim

Belgium has had cryptographic eCash called Protons for nearly two decades now. It is fast efficient for small purchases and paper free.

Their Banksys Proton chip technology is available off the shelf and works (they have some of the best cryptographers in the business).

Oh yeah, Europe is doing some things right, aren't they? Let me rephrase that then: adoption in the U.S.. ;o)

Tim

-- Seven Transistor Labs Electrical Eng>>

Regards, Mikko

Yeah, to mine bitcoin economically you need an ASIC.

Digital 'Fool's Gold'.

Bitcoin is government project to dump dollar debt into monopoly money, and then bust it. Not only this makes easier for dollar but bitcoin weenies will go belly up. Bitcoin bust will call for even more strict regulation over banking, and that would be another gain for authorities.

Bitcoin mining is based on NSA-2 hash function.

VLV

With that in mind, NEVER save bitcoins. SPEND bitcoins fast, LEAVE others holding bitcoins, ALWAYS change to real property as fast as possible.

This applies of course to any currency. Assume that the US $100 bill is so well forged that it passes all checks and the market is flooded with these forgeries, the value of the US dollar will drop.

If someone manages to forge bitcoins, the values will crash rapidly, much faster than a massive invasion of paper bills.

As a rule of thumb, any cryptographic method will be broken sooner or later, the real question is, will the method be secure for a limited period of time when the method is used. Don't expect any cryptological method to be secure forever.

Kinda like what the Fed is doing now.

Bits can be printed even faster than $100 bills.

The real question is what's the point of a bitcoin? It seems about as useful as a Carbon credit.

Your thinking is backwards: it's a good currency specifically because it is completely and utterly pointless. Read up on "fiat currency". Whereas carbon credits were created with a purpose in mind.

Tim

I am surprised you are not all for it - a medium of exchange independent of government control!

How is bitcoin different from a pyramid scheme?

Bullshit. There is even less transparency behind it than there is the USG.

I'm surprised that you advertise that you're a total dolt.

Pyramid schemes are underground?