Topic: drop, rise? 2011 old guard vs newbies vs speculators - the game is on - page 2. (Read 2182 times)

They could also be built seamlessly into the system in a way that doesn't have you thinking in bitcoin prices or the prices in other currencies.  That seems to be how things work on the Atlantis Black Market, prices are in dollars, bitcoins are what you pay with.  It wouldn't be too hard for a site to give the prices for items in the native currencies of any number of people while still having payment in bitcoin.

I wouldn't lose hope so early.
Bitcoin is the first easily accessible, relatively widespread technology that can circumvent restrictions on currency exchange set by governments.

I'm thinking about China where you are not allowed to freely exchange CNY for USD, unless you're very important. And their government is printing CNY faster than the feds are printing USD because they are trying to deflate their own internal housing bubble and at the same time make sure Chinese products' price (in USD) stays low enough.
Or Iran, for what matters.

This could have an important side effect: if you keep constantly changing back and forth from your national currency to bitcoins, after a while you start thinking of prices of goods in bitcoins. So I envision a distant future where bitcoins (or a successor of them) are the worldwide currency of reference.

Albeit for most people in the short term bitcoins mainly are a crazy speculation toy.

I've been involved with them for years.  There used to be a bitcoin e-bay, now there is not.  There used to be more escrow services than there are now.  It feels like we are further from the sort of potential I thought it had than we wee back when it cost less than a dollar to buy a bitcoin.

I haven't given up, I just wouldn't call myself a true believer.

Its a bit early to throw in the towel yet Babylon, bitcoins are process and there is gradual progress happening all the time. Don't expect instant results, it will take years

Oh, and I am no longer a true believer.  I thought bitcoins could revolutionize finance and make it free.  Currently the only thing you can  buy better with bitcoins than fiat is drugs (at least as far as I can tell)  I'm all in favor of a reliable way to conduct online drug deals, but I had a LOT more hope for Bitcoin than that.

I still think they're going to keep going up for a while yet though. 

I think you are spot on on that one.
Damn

I got in in 2010.  I sold too early (2011 and 2012) and don't have much now.  On the other hand, I turned $20 and a little mining into $8000 and I feel pretty good about that.  PLaying with bitcoins is fun partly because it is really easy to win.  Just hold.

Didn't a big dump just happened a few days ago?

My guess is that there are not enough bitcoins around to crash their price much more, given the demand, unless a better cryptocoin becomes popular or some weak spot is found.

So here's how I read the current sentiment around this forum: most people who watched 2011 happen here are now expecting a dump. Most newbies aren't.

2011 bitcoiners are mostly middle-class geeks not pro investors. Their fun-money has suddenly become something you can buy real estate with. At that level there is little point for them in buying more coins with their monthly spare cash - it's like adding a few dimes to a million.
Most of them were true believers at the beginning, yet now I'm not sure most of them still are - to the point they'd actually spend their coins.
Their stash's potential worth keeps oscillating between "decent car" and "financial empire", depending on the news of the day.
So much at stake doesn't make you sleep at night. Turns you into a zombie checking tickers and watching walls.

Newbies - they are coming late to the party and are likely in for the get-rich-quick hype. They don't have the 2011 bias. It's like fathers vs kids. Fathers have cognitive bias so they are uneasy to adapt to new conditions. Kids have inexperience bias so they are likely going to make the same mistakes again.

And then there are speculators. Pro speculators. Likely silent lurkers here. Maybe we are all being played by a few pro's of them who just need to get all the coins for their own play, and are ok with burning some serious amount of fiat in the process. I don't know.

I think BTC price is like Schroedinger's cat. The simple act of us observing walls and talking about them makes it so that they move in the opposite direction of where the most of us expect them to. And yes I think the dump will happen. But only when almost nobody is expecting it anymore. Which makes it hard for us to get profit on the way up.