Topic: bitcoin is failing in replacing fiat in physical shops (Read 8626 times)

extremely slow? sha256 is quite heavy. Number of transactions per minute is huge.
I think few minutes is not "extremly slow"

Definetely I agree, the biggest disadvantage with bitcoin is the extremely slow confirmation.
There is always a risk of chargeback if you do not get even 1 confirmation.

Therefore, the merchants will not take bitcoin as their mean of payment (of course they take it if they are ignorant to this disadvantage or their business doesn't need fast ocnfirmation - for example buying a lamborgini - I can waite 5 hours in a shop if the seller wants enough confirmation but if I am buying groceries, there is no way I am willing to waite 10 minutes to get the first confirmation).

For these everyday transactions, the coin should have fast confirmations (not too fast though because too much speed causes orphan blocks).
WorldCoin is optimal - it can be seen as Bitcoin 2.0 and it is decentrilized (the difficulty is low enough for mining without large mining entities).
The money supply is fixed just like with bitcoin.
The transition from bitcoin to WorldCoin is extremely easy (however you need to prepare around 1 hour for this because it takes time to move bitcoins).
Just open an account to altcoin exchange (cryptsy, vircurex etc), transfer bitcoins, waite around 1 hour until bitcoins arrives and buy worldcoins and transfer them to your WorldCoin wallet - it will not take that long. 

In theory, perhaps. There have been many discussions about the possibilities of doubles spending, the costs to do so, and the risks of being caught. A business that had any volume would pay for their bitcoin processing that watches for double spend and finds them in a few seconds. Then again, there are always green listing services that some shops might require. It would be much easier to forge a check cashing card than double spending bitcoins.

Both check and bitcoin are reversible and subject to fraud risk for some period of time. For bitcoin that time is minutes for checks it may be days or weeks (or possibly even longer). But for the purposes of grocery store checkout the effect is the same.

Both bitcoin and fiat are irreversible. They have nothing in common with checks. In fact, cash can be counterfeited while bitcoin cannot. You should require an ID card for cash as well. Bitcoin is the only money that doesn't have counterparty risk.

You are not more convincing when you use large type. In fact it looks foolish.

Grocery stores solved this problem a long time ago, its called a check cashing card.

If you want to pay by check (at least in the days before automated check approval), you apply for a card, provide ID, address, possibly credit check, etc.  Once you have a card, you can pay with a check. If your check is no good, they know how to send to collections.

Likely to be the same thing for bitcoin, at least for purchases above some amount.

theres still other altcoin around

"I'm the chosen one."

"There can be only one." 

One should think about this more often.

Good point. I think people generally like to pay for products/services without dramas.

We can't Bitcoin has captured the eyes of millions and will only keep on spreading I just saw Bitcoin get mentioned on my local news.

The only purpose of "mining" is to earn BTC. Help and secure the network is just a consequence of this purpose. Therefore you are right, everyone which "mine" could help the network. However, it is not the number of "miners" which have an impact on the security, but the hash rate which one controls to compete with each other. When business compete with each other, they will have to manage costs to operate the "mining" equipment. The whole operation is a liability and thus the need to be compensated with revenue. To increase revenue the "miner" will have to sell BTC in a volatile exchange market. However, as more "miners" compete with each other, more the liability increases. To increase the revenue, the "miner" will have to buy more equipment. But more equipment, more liability. The revenue generated by the equipment do not depend on the BTC obtained, but in how much it worth in the exchange markets. So as long the price of BTC in fiat money increases in proportion with the generated BTC, the liability could cover the revenue. If the liability is not compensated by the revenue, then game over. That is not good business.


"Mining" has nothing to do with honesty but with money. The idea that people are "mining" because they are honest is ludicrous. Whatever entity decides to "mine" to secure the network will have to be ready to afford high levels of liability in their books.

Bitcoin is used in Germany more than Zimbabwe dollars. I would say that makes Bitcoin bigger than a fiat currency in physical shops.

The op has suggested that Bitcoin is "failing" and is not the same as failed already. Maybe the good question to ask is, how can we make it more successful? Run campaigns, marketing, intro classes? Anyone?

Over the last several pages, we've been having an intelligent conversation about the risks vs rewards of accepting 0-confirm transactions at brick-and-mortar stores.  Perhaps you were speaking to the OP 7 pages back?

Bitcoin is not failing and why are you here speading fud to lower the price of Bitcoin?

After the issue gets fixed you should be fine.

Some half-baked thoughts on this topic:  

Very roughly, the % lost due to fraudulent double spends is proportional to the percentage of hash rate controlled by a fraudulent mining group willing to accept out-of-band transaction AND the percentage of the population that will download an app (and thereby knowingly engage in fraud) to transmit the out-of-band double spend.  Mathematically:

    % loss on 0-confirms  = (% hash power controlled by fraud miners) x (% of consumers engaged in fraud).

If we assume 20% of the hash power is fraudulent (much more than I would expect) and that 10% of consumers will attempt to cheat every time (much more than I would expect), then the % loss on 0-confirms is 2%:

    % loss on 0-confirms = (0.2) x (0.1) = 0.02 = 2%.

Like DeathAndTaxes said, 2% is too much for a grocery store, but not too much for Naughty America.  However, I think more reasonable numbers would be that only 5% (or less) of the hash rate is fraudulent, and that perhaps only 2% of consumers (or less) would attempt to cheat.  With these numbers we get only 0.1% losses (or less):

    % loss on 0-confirms < (0.05) x (0.02) = 0.001 = 0.1%.

Some other interesting things I noted:

1.  If the % of hash power accepting out-of-band double spends is 25%, double-spenders would receive one quarter of their purchases for free [of course, they still risk getting caught and charged with a crime, similar to using a stolen credit card or counterfeit bills].  However, as the % of hash power controlled by the "fraud miners" decreases, this service becomes a lot less tempting.  If they only control 1% of hash rate, then double-spenders only succeed 1% of the time, in which case I think very few would even bother and the problem mostly disappears.

2.  Another note is that it probably won't be a single group accepting the out-of-band double spends.  A good double spend app, however, would want to transmit the fraudulent transaction to all the knowingly-complicit hash power, in order to maximize the odds of a successful double spend.  Now, these fraud miners need to stay on the down-low, which means they will be moving around lots, etc., and the apps will need to be constantly updated with the latest info.  But this confusion means that honest people have an opportunity to pose as fraud miners, just so that they can broadcast (i.e., leak) the double spends onto the network and neutralize the double-spend threat.  In other words, the double-spend threat can be neutralized by leaking the fraudulent transaction.

It will be interesting to see how it all develops....