Topic: Bitcoin Powerpoint Presentation (Read 6950 times)

My Ignite talk in Washington DC is now up at  http://ignite-dc.blip.tv/file/4801077/.  Thanks for everyone's help!

Thanks for all these great tips and information, I'll get them in!


--Darrell

They can be 25-44 characters long, in fact. This is a valid address (not owned by anyone, of course):
11111111111111111111BZbvjr

 

This chart is the same data, but I think it is more readable and less misleading. There were virtually zero coins traded at 0.50 a daily average is more honest data imo.

It is from bitcoincharts.com which you should probably mention anyway since it's an awesome site. Ah, i see it is already in the upper right corner.

A few small things:

I think it's more accurate to say that bitcoin generation decays geometrically, not exponentially. Maybe write "New issuance decreases geometrically leading to a fixed limit of 21 million bitcoins in 2140"

50 every ~10min is more accurate

It should be made clear (verbal is fine) that the faucet is just a site someone runs, not another method of issuance.

Maybe replace "Sell something for them" with "Accept them as payment" or "Sell your products for them". I think it's more inspiring and less one-off sounding. Personal preference though.

The richest list looks weird being highlighted grey like that. You might also mention that those could be the balances of banks so it's misleading both ways.

On the map slide I would say verbally that it only shows nodes that are active now or recently and reiterate that you don't need to run a node to use bitcoin so there are more users than the map implies.

Addresses are not always 34 chars. 33 and I think 32 are possible.

Ok, I've taken in a lot of your suggestions and updated the slides, they're available at http://bitcoinbasics.com.
  There is still more for me to process about some of the suggestions above., but let me know what you think now if you have a moment.

Thanks,
   --Darrell
     http://bitcoinbasics.com

Any company wanting to provide the possibility of chargebacks would get identity info on its users, if there was no money left in the account they would choose whether to go after it or sell it to collections or whatever.

From the slides it looks like the Potomac is a paper currency temporarily pegged to the dollar that you can get at a discount? Is there any more to it? Is there a person or group who promises to exchange back to dollars or is it somehow valuable to people without this guarantee?

The security issues slide is inconsistent. Saying the same thing different ways is great in fiction, bad in technical prose and terrible in a chart. Pick "No" or "Nope" don't switch.

On the same chart under theft you talk about recourse for everything but the Potomac, but for it you say "Easy to do, but unlikely" shouldn't it read "No recourse" according to the pattern of info you've been putting in. If you really want to keep this I think it needs to be separated into "Easy of theft" and "Recourse after theft". All in all it's an absolute info overload and most people won't focus on what you want them to, but instead think "I only paid $25 for my canceled check" or "I'd rather be phishing right now"

All the charts though confuse the issue that bitcoin is a different currency and a different payment method. It wouldn't be fair to bitcoin to talk about bitcoinmail's silly policy of keeping money not claimed in two weeks and putting that on your chart. Likewise it isn't fair to compare bitcoin's no chargebacks to some services people buy specifically because they allow chargebacks when a bitcoin chargeback service could very well exist soon.

Different subject. If you are going to flash up three widows of bitcoin stuff for 15 seconds at least make the main window sit in the exact same place on each slide so people don't have to 'reprocess' it and it is very clear that someone clicked a button and a new window come up, not a whole different thing. I know bitcoin is simple, but when multiple windows open and move and have 32 digit addresses on them anything you can do to make it look as simple as it is is good. I know this means the first window won't fill the whole screen, that's okay. It won't on their monitor at home either. Minor thing, but I think it will help.

Vulnerabilities need elaborated on. Without doing that Bitcoin sounds like trash. 

Bittorrent is thriving and it almost exclusively used to do things that have been illegal for decades. And this is without monetary incentive to the peers like there is in bitcoin. Do not imply that some dictate from Senators can stop Bitcoin and leave it at that.

If 99% of nodes decide to keep generation at 50BTC/block it won't affect those who keep the original rules. You won't be bale to fool them. This is true of other types of rule changes too, like altering difficulty or something. Correct rule following nodes will reject all bad tx and keep doing their own thing. 50% applies to rewriting history mainly. If you want to keep this one I would say it like "An attacker who can match the power entire network can "unspend" his own coins." 

Bitcoin will scale well. "Too much milk will kill you" How much? "Enough to kill you" It's pretty meaningless. But by saying it you imply that there is some point where it breaks. Sure there will come a point where a computer from 2007 using 2010 internet won't be able to get transactions fast enough to be useful, but that doesn't matter. There are incentives in place that ensure people will solve the problem. 

I think blaming a currency for the distribution of wealth is ridiculous, but I know a lot of people might think that way. I think it's like blaming paper for what is written on it. Money is for keeping track of who has provided goods and services in the past and it entitled to similar in the future. If you don't like what that implies then you have a problem with money not this particular money.

If you talk about "nefarious activity" maybe make a joke like "But that hasn't been a problem for the dollar"

"Other" seems like filler. Just don't claim your list is comprehensive.

I know that's a lot. Let me know if you want me to do more or if I'm just being a drag.

Thanks for all the great suggestions.  I'm going to work on it more this evening and see what I can come up with.  I agree I need a better background.  I'll see whatelse I can incorporate, you've got great points.

As for the charts, I agree they are overload.  with only 15 seconds per slide, I plan on only talking about the Bitcoin features, and just letting the audience take in the other fields as they read them, I don't plan to cover everything. 

I have a personal interest in promoting the Potomac as well, although it is not the focus of this presentation.  However, I expect there will be people in the audience who will be more interested in thh Potomac and I want them to know that it exists.  I believe that by including it in these slides offers the idea that there is a lot of change happening in the currencies that we use, and each one adds validity to the other by including them both for this particular audience I'm speaking to. 

The Potomac seems boring and unrelated to Bitcoin. Why did you decide to put both in a really short presentation?

I know you can't change your title now, but maybe you could make kind of a joke out of it. Like "Hi, I'm going to to tell you about 2 new currencies the Potomac and Bitcoin. The Potomac is a papar currency like you're all familiar with; it is accepted by X people in the DC area. Okay now onto Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a completely new kind of currency."

I know you don't have a lot of time, but I think it needs a lot of work to be good. Are you allowed to change the slides at all after you submit or are they totally locked?

Overall plan:

Start with a "Bitcoin is" slide; it is a new currency and a system for transferring that currency.
Then "What is required in a currency"
Then "Bitcoin has these features"
Combine or kill those blue charts.
Expand the vulnerabilities topic into a few slides so you don't leave misconceptions like you will now.
Don't end with vulnerabilities, we'll find something positive to put there.

Also I think you should rethink the background. At the very least you should invert colors so it is light and then alter the contrast so it isn't distracting and use black text.

Let me know if you are willing to work on these changes and I'll try to help with wording and details. How much have you worked on what you'll say? I'm guessing this is a rapid fire thing and you will need to be excited in order to stand out. Try to find ways to express how world-changing this could be without coming off as being a dreamer/crazy.

This brings up an important point you need to make. Bitcoin is two things. It is a new unit of account/money/currency whatever you want to call it. And it is a method of payment. A good one, but you can build others on top, like mybitcoin or paypal.

One FAQ I get is "why not use Paypal?"

My answer is:  Paypal is a layer on top of currencies.  Paypal offers digital access and fraud protection on top of various currencies (USD, EUR, JPY, ...).  In the distant future, Paypal would hopefully offer BTC as a supported currency, alongside USD and EUR.

It really isn't that compelling to me and it's a topic I'm very interested in. I'll try to be more helpful when I get the time.

The biggest problem I see is all the time spent on comparisons with other systems. Definately mention them when it comes up like "Because of the nature of the Bitcoin peer network there can be no chargebacks, unlike PayPal where merchants can have funds disappear even after 30 days." or "There will only ever be 21 million bitcoins in existence; this ensures that the value of bitcoin holders cannot be diluted as value held in dollars can."

Those charts are boring and contain lots of unnecessary information.

Make this clearer "Bitcoin 'Mining' (~50 BTC created / 10 min)" (slide 14), my computer would make ~50 BTC every 78 days (if I actually mined with it).

Right away before looking at more than a few slides I would suggest you change that background. No one is going to want to stare at that for however long you are speaking.

ok I fixed the permissions, its available now at http://bitcoinbasics.com

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