Topic: Can someone please explain to me WHY I should accept BTC over gold or silver? - page 3. (Read 6636 times)

Yeah but they're already in one basket (in the dollar basket)

It would be unwise to put all your eggs in one basket.

Gotta decide for yourself. But make sure you understand as much as possible and are comfortable or you are going to screw yourself by panicking on any downswing. No need to do it all at once either.

So I've got like $5000 saved up so should I put i all into bitcoin

That's the most important, but besides that, there are the advantages others explained already, mainly the fact that bitcoin is decentralized by design. To accept gold payments, you either have to trust a third party - which will probably be vulnerable to a government, and then bye bye privacy/security - or you'll have to accept physical gold plus silver and copper for small changes, meaning you'll have to find ways of protecting this physical gold, not to mention the hassle and limitations (cost!) on transportation.

Protecting data is certainly easier (cheaper!) than protecting anything physical. Data may be backed up, a physical commodity cannot, meaning if your safe gets destroyed, you lose. Data may be encrypted, meaning that even if someone has access to it, he would also need a password. And with the existent techniques to create hidden encrypted volumes, even torturing you to get the password may not be enough to get everything you have.

I haven't read the entire topic, I'm just answering directly the OP. The following charts should make it pretty much clear why you would prefer using BTC instead of gold:

There's no charge to receive Bitcoin. If people want to pay a transaction fee, that's up to the buyer.

There's also no charge to store Bitcoin. EGold has a storage fee.

#bitcoin-otc

#bitcoinOTC on IRCfreenode if I recall correctly

Dark pools are no problem. If it hasn't been said yet, dark pool trades on Mtgox are shown after they happen, just not before. This is more transparent to you than when someone PMs me and I make a sale to them. In that case you never see anything about the trade and that's fine because it's not your business to know what everyone is doing. There are pros and cons to making offers in private vs public. Neither chose hurts people, but public offers do help people a little in that they get an extra opportunity and a little info.

What is the channel name? I tried #OTC, but there is just one person in there.

Hi DERP,

The stamp comment was meant to point out how btc has one of the good properties of gold in the extreme. You can put a million dolars worth of gold in a backpack, but you can put a million dollars worth of bitcoins onto a <1gram SD card.

Bitcoin doesn't have an exchange built in, really nothing does. For a lot of things there is one major marketplace, for bitcoin right now that is mtgox.com. No matter what the price is there though you can choose to sell your coins or not at whatever price anyone offers you. Mtgox is just a place where people make offers to each other.

The reason people value bitcoin so much is for a lot of the same reasons people value gold. They are both durable, divisible (bitcoin more easily so), transferable (bitcoin more so), fungilbe, and scarce. For different scenarios one or the other is more suitable, I have both. For most of what I do though Bitcoin makes more sense.

There's the OTC (over the counter) channel on IRCfreenode with a web of trust application attached to it. Some of the most trusted traders over there have a lot of BTC on their hands. It's probably the second best place after MtGox to get ahold of BTC and it's definitaly further away from the spotlights than Gox.

Excellent post goatpig, thank you very much for your reply. I may ask you more questions about what you said later, but I want to talk more about this Mt. Gox website and dark pool trading.

Do you or does anyone know a lot about Mt. Gox and BTC trading, specifically in dark pools for large amounts of BTC? Basically is there anything from stopping me and some other large volume BTC traders (if any exist and I can contact them) from allowing reciprocal access to our dark pool trading information and localizing liquidity during certain market conditions? This seems to be a bit unfair to everyone else, but if there are no rules preventing this then why not?

Anyone who is interested in colluding or knows more about this subject please do not hesitate to contact me privately.

DERP, I suppose what we're getting at through the course of this conversation is that BTC is a currency in its infancy.  There are really only two reasons one should use it as a currency at this moment:

- You dislike centralized/governmental currencies, and would like to see bitcoins replace them all, so you are willing to put the effort into making as many transactions with bitcoins as possible, in the hopes that it will help stabilize and promote the currency.
- You are a speculator, and are actively using it to make money through speculation, investments, and other related transactions.

It is a HOPE that bitcoins will achieve the same or greater level of usage and usability as something like gold does.  It's not there yet, not even close.  But it is growing stronger and more usable every day.  It's just not to the point where it can compete with other currencies out there, but it CAN compete with other currencies if more and more people keep using it.

BTW, there is a way to physically exchange bitcoins too - look at www.bitbills.com

Yes.


Mining is a different approach to entering the BTC market. It is highly profitable right now, but it takes some time to set it up and get it running and requires rapidly depreciating computer hardware to run it, not to mention it his highly competitive. It is simply easier and faster to buy some BTC.

Also anyone who bought BTC in early April is looking at much higher profits (3-4 times) than those who spend the exact same amount in mining rigs.



BTC as a store of value has the same properties as gold, it thus naturally attracts anyone who can appreciate the qualities of gold. It offers those qualities in a different aspect, mainly that it is fully digitalized. That's the "sales pitch" to gold bugs. It is expected that anyone who values gold will value BTC for the same reasons, and part of those people will want to buy into BTC for the digital aspect. This is only considering BTC as a store of value. If some vendors start supporting it, then the sky's the limit.

Given these points, the more BTC is publicized, the more newcomers show up wanting to buy some, and the higher the exchange rate goes. As long as BTC doesn't encounter a major system failure, there is nothing to stop it from growing.


Gold appreciates like 1% a month right now I think. From my own estimate, gathered from the recent press hits and the upcoming CIA conference in June, I'd expect BTC to be around $15 at least by early July. Considering it's waving around $6~$8 right now, that's about double in value. But don't take that for granted, it only my humble guess, establish your own estimate from the informations you gather.

Guys I just want to say again how much I appreciate your help and input. Please know that I am grateful.

I notice on that website they allow users to trade in dark pools. This basically allows for large transactions to occur without sending a corresponding price signal to other market participants. How exactly is this beneficial to the market as whole, as opposed to those in the dark pools?


I accept your opinion that USD is not a good store of value. As I said earlier, USD is basically a short-term currency for me as I am more interested in purchasing equities and commodities as stores of value. In this respect, USD seems to be a superior choice for a short-term currency because it is accepted is many more places than BTC, it is readily recognizable to basically everyone on the globe, and it can be transacted easily in physical form without a need for computerized devices.


Not many people in countries that have been dominated by banking and mortgage markets. For example I can buy a very, very nice property in Viet Nam with a very large amount of open land for just few gold coins. The value of the coins can be easily determined by looking at central exchanges located in any number of different cities on the globe. It is not the fault of gold that Westerners do not know the value of it and I would not consider that a weak point against gold.

What do you think is the best way I can trade my BTC for the same property in Viet Nam? What angle should I use?


How does clearcoin operate and how do they verify transactions? What kind of a commission do they charge?

Bitcoin2cash gave the correct answer.

There are no chargebacks. Either insist that you receive the goods before sending BTC or use an escrow service if you don't want to expose yourself to that kind of risk.


https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade