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Topic: Approximately, how many bitcoin are lost FOREVER!!! (Read 1362 times)

tlo
newbie
Activity: 19
Merit: 0
I guess several 100k BTC are lost forever.

I remember this story:
"In July 2011, the operator of Bitomat, the third largest bitcoin exchange, announced that he lost access to his wallet.dat file with about 17,000 bitcoins (roughly equivalent to 220,000 USD at that time). He announced that he would sell the service for the missing amount, aiming to use funds from the sale to refund his customers."

Taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin
sr. member
Activity: 686
Merit: 250
I'm sure Bitcoin is infinitely divisible, the more destroyed the higher the value of the remaining coins.

However transactions of BTC0.000000000000000000001 would become somewhat annoying for day to day use.
full member
Activity: 196
Merit: 100
Well I lost my very first ever bitcoin when I formatted my pc Sad
newbie
Activity: 16
Merit: 0
I'm almost sure (well, not really) Satoshi went crazy not having access to millions of early btc and simply quit.

Satoshi is one wealthy hobo Roll Eyes
edd
donator
Activity: 1414
Merit: 1002
The 21 million limit imposed by Satoshi was just an arbitrary number.

Let's say one million coins have been "lost forever." If Satoshi had made the limit 20 million and no one lost any, the network would be in exactly the same place it is now.

Even if we take into consideration the fact that more coins may be lost, as the value increases (for whatever reason), the precautions users take to avoid losing them will increase accordingly.
member
Activity: 66
Merit: 10
1 mil is a lot. I feel sorry for people who lost bitcoins in early days and thinking what the heck its just few pennies, only now realizing how big loss it was
full member
Activity: 213
Merit: 100
a buddy of mine lost his password and username to a wallet with like 55 btc in it
newbie
Activity: 28
Merit: 0
There is so many lost forever..
newbie
Activity: 25
Merit: 0
i believe that something must be done immediately to deny addresses that havent been seen on the network payments over a very small amount. i think some groups are probably buying bitcoin and sending them to nonexistant addresses to devalue and kill the coin.
Divisible down to 8 decimal places. They can destroy all they want, it won't accomplish anything.

I'm sure a similar thing was said about IPv4..

Exactly. Way too many people hyping this as some infallible system at the moment.
newbie
Activity: 28
Merit: 0
This is not good for bitcoin... increases price yes? Long term bitcoin is affected by available number tho.
member
Activity: 92
Merit: 10
Can't find secret notepad with all passwords...FML!
newbie
Activity: 18
Merit: 0
Check out the following report and plots about "What happened to early bitcoins?" https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/what-happened-to-early-bitcoins-215946
It shows whether early coins are being traded in exchanges (hint: very few).

Someone estimated there are at least 1 million lost coins.
newbie
Activity: 56
Merit: 0
newbie
Activity: 2
Merit: 0
its easy to lose em. 3 million
newbie
Activity: 28
Merit: 0
Is say 500,000 - 1 million
STT
legendary
Activity: 4102
Merit: 1454
A recovery system might be a way to recover what is not yours.  Every exception they add to the rules makes for easier corruption.
newbie
Activity: 8
Merit: 0
There should be a recovery system in place that they go to
legendary
Activity: 2646
Merit: 1138
All paid signature campaigns should be banned.
You can read about that somewhere in this paper: http://eprint.iacr.org/2012/584.pdf
If i remember correctly i think about 2 million BTCs is lost for ever.
A ton are lost forever..

So that means that each Bitcoin must weigh (2,000 pounds lost) / (2,000,000 BTC lost) = 0.001 pounds / BTC
newbie
Activity: 8
Merit: 0
i believe that something must be done immediately to deny addresses that havent been seen on the network payments over a very small amount. i think some groups are probably buying bitcoin and sending them to nonexistant addresses to devalue and kill the coin.
Divisible down to 8 decimal places. They can destroy all they want, it won't accomplish anything.

I'm sure a similar thing was said about IPv4..
newbie
Activity: 28
Merit: 0
ive hears stories about people losing thousands in the early days so I bet theres quite a fair amount gone forever.
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