Topic: How stable will bitcoin be? (Read 16057 times)

By looking at one side you can tell that bitcoin is better than fiat, but when it comes to being use for daily transactions fiat is not question the best. The reason why we are using fiat as we can easily use it even in the physical world and everybody recognize it as a legal tender, while bitcoin is not that popular.

If you look at normal currency vs. Bitcoin I'm assuming bitcoins will be constantly on a 2-3% rise because of inflation on any other currency. So it depends what you're comparing it to. If we're talking about a currency with normal inflation then yes it'll be relatively stable at some point but if we're talking about currencies that are new or currencies that have a higher rate of inflation (3rd world countries) bitcoins will seem less stable there even if it's stable in terms of the value in another country. Either way you'll be better of with bitcoins rather than fiat!

i agree with you that stable price of bitcoin is for temporary and i also hope that bitcoin price will be sooner start to rise up again and i am sure that bitcoin will be reach its price to above 1000$ in the year of 2017 so the next year will be year of bitcoin and we will be get a big profit from bitcoin.

I think the instability of bitcoin is not permanent it is unstable because people are continuously accepting bitcoin and are investing here, so the demand is continuously increasing and the supply is constant (for time being) bitcoin price  remain unstable but I think when all the people will start using bitcoin then bitcoin will certainly become a successful yet fluctuating for at least next 100 years.

It is not as simple as it appears to be

Some purchases take longer time to make (e.g. buying a car), and the buyer can cancel the purchase any time until he actually pays for the goods. Needless to say that sellers will be at a disadvantage here. If the price changes in the favor of the seller, the buyer will be inclined to refuse from making a purchase and restart the process all over again. On the other hand, if the price changes in the favor of the buyer, the seller will be effectively subsidizing him

The volatility/instability is a plus for some risky investors, while it is a detractor for those interested in holding it for longer periods of time, shoppers, and so on and so forth. Bitcoin with the value fluctuations it has right now is great for workers and investors (when it goes up) and bad for everyone when it goes down.

As for retailers changing their prices, they could just sit with a fiat price and adjust the required BTC to meet that requirement. They do that with steam already.

The stability of Bitcoin is actually like a two-edged sword which has its advantages and disadvantages in the sense that the instability of the price is actually bringing more people into Bitcoin because the increase or decrease cannot be predicted as I can buy at $750 and the next week its $780. On the otherhand, its what is keeping major merchants out as it means they have to keep changing their price tag to reflect to changes in the price of Bitcoin every time...

I agree with you but for that time to come we have to see the time when everyone adopt bitcoin and the flow of it becomes constant all over the world so in that time the demand of bitcoin will remain constant and the price will be stable too.

This is kinda idealistic approach

So let's take a more realistic one. A prosperous society may make Bitcoin more popular indeed, but that alone could only contribute to wider Bitcoin adoption (which is good) and higher prices (which is also good), but which will work more toward volatility than stabilization of prices. More users would just make the market thinner simply because users tend to hoard bitcoins, thereby making it more prone to severe price swings. Further, governmental control over prices (whichever form it might take) will instantly kill Bitcoin before they even manage to fully employ it, thereby it can only stabilize prices at zero. But that's likely not what you meant

These are some points that some people ignore. The price is a result of supply and demand, and while Bitcoin works in a free market, the price will always vary, as varies the price of the fiat currencies and many other assets. The reason why the price of Bitcoin varies more strongly is related to the fact that the network is still maturing.

Why not? I think there are certain factors which can make btc stable: 1) prosperous society, making people believe more into ideal thigs like btc; 2) governmental control, which will allow to regulate the price; 3) More btc users. The more users we have the less changes can be made by some specific ones, because there tend to be less people having a lot of btc and so the influence potential is becoming more equal.

Price keeps changing because of the transactions and the increasing demand in the markets, the more people or companies buying bitcoin increases the more volatile its price would become because as the demand increases it would increase the price as well with itself.

I agree with you many people will not support for paper money because already many people have invested into bitcoin. Because after may people supporting the bitcoin it already enforces that many countries are completely willing to go with cash less transaction in coming days. Really if this happen every country will start using the same technology to go with cash less in future.

If this strong uptrend is an outcome of expanding Bitcoin adoption, it could last for very long time with only minor corrections now and then. Bitcoin has been rising for over three months starting an early September after the price had recovered from the consequences of the Bitfinex hack. And these consequences themselves could have been just the thieves massively selling the stolen bitcoins...

If they just kept the coins, or the hack didn't happen at all, we might have already been with 4 digits

I don't think that bitcoin will ever be stable

bitcoin does not have a definite stability, bitcoin has a very asharp exchange value, maybe this moment we are faced with a steep ravine next

you can see the price of bitcoin will be stable, but it only happens for a short while only. then the speed of change in price will again changed very quickly. practically stable prices only temporary

Credit card or paypal defiintely can't replace currency.it's the way government could digitalize the currency so the current currency will be digitalized by those.credit card and paypal is basically a service and not a currency therefore the currency will remain there and not going to be annihilated

thinking of how stable bitcoin will be  for the now bitcoin has beginning to be know by many people  today and been that is been decentralize and is mostly likely to be equal to dollar as soon as people get to know this fact people will begin to use it and i see it becoming more stable in the future say some few years from now. 

To be honest I don't see that bitcoin would ever replace paper money. Most probably it will just be used like credit card that is accepted by stores because they can get some paper money if they accept it. If this scenario were to happen, bitcoin would still have a volatile price, since it is a decentralized currency and the price will always move if someone buys or sell.

That's probably the area we are in. The bullish trend at the moment is gradual, yet strong and without large scale dumps. And with respect to the volatility years ago, in fact Bitcoin is reaching better levels as time passes, I think this is good for the general user, who tries to adopt a new currency.

Bitcoin will never be stable if you could see the graph of the price of bitcoin this past few years its not stable but bitcoin will never be disappear as long as there are many investors and new users eachday remember that bitcoin users is a huge part of the economy of bitcoin without users bitcoin will never grow.

I agree, don't thank no government is gonna make bitcoin a world currency or nonathat.  But if you all want it to be a currency, then it'd be a dang good thing if it were stable, wouldn't it?  We nowhere near that right now.  Bitcoin be up an' down like a goddamn yo yo.  That be nice if you gamblin' on it but real bad if you spendin' it.

Bitcoin in my opinion will never be stable even if it replaced other currencies since volatility will always be present since bitcoin is being traded in a free market. It will just be stable for a week or so and then it's price will move later on if someone buy and someone sells. That's how bitcoin works. Also if government collapsed and internet and electricity becomes unstable, then I think less users will use bitcoin unless there will be a way to spend bitcoin without internet and electricity in that time.

However, it is unpredictable. Bitcoin can easily be affected by many events aroung the world. These Consequences are most likely happen every two weeks. Traders can not foretell them and it is hard to know when to sell or to buy them

I started to think that volatile prices keep people hyped
And it doesnt really damage money, cause its limited supply.
So I think bitcoin should never be stable at all.

Volatility is needed to attract fresh money from people around the world. That's how you keep the market liquid. But then you can also say that when there is a decent level of stability. It will attract fresh money from people looking to use Bitcoin as long term store of value tool. Either way, money will flow into the Bitcoin eco system.

As internet is now one of the most important part of our life. And specially the new generation are totally depending on it, as they now giving preference to online trading and business hence we cannot think about internet to remain absent from our life.

Bitcoin can replace fiat if all the people of the world start using bitcoin and ignore fiat. This way we can expect bitcoin will stay with us as a stable currency for ever.

One good thing about Bitcoin is the price is not stable. I say it is a good thing because traders are most likely will earn because of the unstable of Bitcoin price buy low and sell high.

   First your link is not working "Sorry, we couldn't find that!". You know what bitcoin require, and how much of it bitcoin needs to be stable, just you forget about fiat :
https://g.foolcdn.com/editorial/images/129814/factory-inside_large.JPG
    What you people think that fiat money is made from air? And all their factories dont need electricity, and man power, big machines?
"So... bitcoin substitutes currency, government is destabilized, society descends (or ascends?) into anarcy, electricity & internet become unstable, society descends into the next dark age.  Has anyone thought about that?"  What??? Are you living in EU or USA, maybe Australia or Kuwait? That is happening for last 100 years without break. Its like that in my country, and believe there is countries in much worst situation then my country. People wake up!

It won't be solved just for the increase in the market cap

The market cap itself reflects the price of Bitcoin. If the latter is set to increase, so will the former. I specifically mention this so that we could speak directly in terms of price, not some obscure concept like market cap, which may mean a thousand different things. The price will increase if the demand for bitcoins rises (or supply decreases, which is essentially the same), which would lead to more bitcoins being stashed away (otherwise the price simply wouldn't rise). This basically means that less amount of bitcoins will be traded, and, consequently, you will be able to move the price with less bitcoins than it is required now (to move the price for the same percentage). Thereby, we can only expect the rise in volatility with the rise in price. I would be happy to hear any plausible arguments refuting this approach, but so far I'm heavily inclined to think that the things will unfold exactly in this way

If there is ever a worldwide interruption then we need to worry about surviving and not silly little bitcoins.

the way bitcoin price is volatile these days is not because of its design!

it is because the market is not yet big enough and exchanges are too small, and with the smallest change price goes wild. in the future as more people start using bitcoin changing price also becomes harder.

think of it this way, if you spread FUD about gold, gold price may only go down half a dollar but spread the same FUD about bitcoin and it goes down $50. now compare bitcoin with 2011 the same FUD could hit the price $500

Yes, bitcoin is not here to replace any currency, bitcoin itself a currency and now people started using bitcoin as currency even in their local shops, although bitcoin is depending on internet and electricity, but I think in present time all of our banks that deal in fait currency also mostly depend on internet and electricity, therefore I think it is not a valid reason to reject bitcoin as currency and to use it only for investment purpose.

volatility is being reduced as market cap is growing, you may think a increase of 50 usd in value is very volatile now but reading the history charts they show pumps or dumps of more than 25% in a single day was a daily basis.  
hopefully we are now inside a steady uptrend.

well. in some points you have a valid point. bitcoin is basically designed for Traders and for exchangers.. if bitcoin price stable at one price and don't go up and down. than it won't remain an Ideal Currency for traders. right now traders and miners love bitcoin because it have the potential to give lots of profit..

There is nothing inherently stable or unstable about Bitcoin's design. It is just that when the market cap is relatively small, actions by a few players can move the market. Once the market cap increases, this problem should be solved.
About making money, Bitcoin was not just made for the day traders. 

I really liked and truly believe what you told is correct Mr.Fergalish, as everyone wants bitcoin to replace the currency of world currency but everyone forgets that it cannot be possible , Bitcoin is mostly should be used as investment option and another currency to enjoy the online purchase and other works.

The discussion are going too far, let's back to the topic up here.
We do thinking and predicting about how bitcoin will be in the future, for 2-5 years later is more reasonable to predict if you have exceptional analytical skills about world economics with all of the factors affecting it. Yes, I agree if bitcoin won't replace any currency as we need every currency as state based exchange rate and medium of exchange. Too far to say bitcoin would make government become unstable and created anarchy.

It depends on the demand, if the demand increases so does the price, but if the demand decreases then the price will start being stable i guess, because we have a limited amount of bitcoins in circulation which makes the price grow when the demand and usage increases.

I think bitcoin will never be a stable price. I guess bitcoin
has been created not to be stagnant price but design to be
a volatile price. Because if bitcoin will stable others wont get
easily earn money.

Bitcoin stabilisation is still a long way to go as an when all the bitcoins are mined , the price of bitcoins will not be stable and the price of bitcoins will still go on increasing.

I think bitcoin will not experience to be stable because it is unpredictable and bitcoin is always depends in demand and supply.. even in the future..
They are not the same as fiat that it takes a year before the price is change..
Bitcoin has a fast movement until now we are experience of fast movement of the price and i think in the future we have slow movement but it will never be stable just like other said..

A few months ago I believed it would take a long time for Bitcoin to achieve some stability, but now I realize that this may happen earlier than expected. It is important to note that Bitcoin can become more stable, and at the same time continue to increase in value. The important thing is that large pumps and dumps do not happen very often.

bitcoin will eventualy be stable, but when the market cap is on bilions, to soon to be stable.... it could take 10 years but it will get there

Yeah there is low fluctuate but we can not consider it as stable bitcoin will never be stable because it is unpredictable and the price of bitcoin is always relaying on demand and supply.. Because many people are discovering bitcoin and the benefits they are investing in bitcoin that can affect the value of bitcoin.. You can see right now more sites are actually accepting bitcoin as mode of payment unlike last year i experience of some sites are not acept there is a difference right now i saw many site are now adding bitcoin as payment mode.. so more price will increase and bitcoin will never stable..

i don't know what you want to say but the value is not predictable at all, bitcoin will be stable only when many will use it, and by many i mean 100 million people at least not less


bitcoin will be a currency, not a comodity, unlike gold that will be used as a currency, bitcoin just need more aodption

yet time will come it might rise higher than that or low lower than predicted % so, the value of bitcoin is not stable yet still rising high. It is acceptable as long as it is rising, the bitcoin price.

Since we can see how bitcoin rise and low of pricing we cannot totally say that it is stable since we can only predict its % of highland low fluctuation.

Price would really intend to rise since the demand is increasing and as you said more people are using it since the bitcoin adoption really cant be stopped and it will continue to grow furthermore and we should really expect the price increase but still its still not sure because we are just on earlier years of bitcoin. Theres soo much things that might happen along the way.

Exactly, many people do not know about bitcoin, since this year is i think more people or users know it than last few years, thats the reason maybe why the price more became higher value. Because the price depends the user, thats why, the more people uses bitcoin, the higher value of the price we can get. Sooner or later, we dont expect that the price is already much higher, stable and become more popular. Become the future to one of us.

Bitcoin will indeed flourish if we keep on believing and investing into bitcoins. Without our help it will die and go back to being more unstable. Right now there has been much more predictable dips and rises. Let's just hope that we get that great adoption where a lot more companies adopts bitcoin like skrill. I hope alibaba as well adopts bitcoin. That will really improve the situation of Bitcoins.

you have apoint there but as long as there's a lot of investors which are supporting bitcoin theres no way that bitcoin could disappear thats why bitcoin will be stable as long as we(investors) putting our money on bitcoin so that cycle on economy of bitcoin currency exchange will be always active and never be inactive. so if you want to more stable bitcoin you must encourage all your friends to invest in bitcoin and tell them the advantages of this cryptocurrency.

TL;DR=Bitcoin is same like gold , and not stable for long time. I can't understand your post

All depends by demand and market flow , even it's on stable price for sure can't stay for long time because most peoples use this advantage for buy/sell their funds . For now Bitcoin's price on $750+ and go to $780 .

As of now it keeps pumping and it is really good news to us . But we know sooner or later the bug drop happen
 But lets just enjoy this moment.but past few months the price of bitcoin is very stable then boom the price keepy raising and higher. And  i thin the price of bitcoin is not really stable but there are really time that it is stable but it raises frequently

comodity in trading can't stable price, bitcoin same gold, is comodity
in trading all comodity can't flate price, because is flate price can't trade
you can see , dowjones or another market is can't stable and flate price
all comodity can up and can down price

I think indeed Bitcoin will still have big dips like what happens when an exchange dies/closes or there was a scamminghacking on an exchange like what recently happened to bitfinex. We can't control this but if it happens there are quite alot of effect. The dip was the major one. Another would be that the confidence in bitcoin lowers. If maybe it will be adopted by large corps then probably we can see a stability. But before that stability the prices for sure will rise.

Yeah, but if everyone does that, then there's no way you'll get alot of money/pesos for doing that since the net worth of bitcoin is falling down so rapidly.
We've seen it on the big markets before, once something starts crashing, it is going to crash heavily, especially bitcoin, since it is not regulated by a bank/state/country.
Bitcoin is probably never going to be stable, unless a big bank is also jumping into bitcoin and buys a big portion of the market.

Since the prediction of the value is predictable still it in not stable as we all know so, prediction cannot be the base stability of it.

Well if bitcoins volatility focuses on the upward trend then I suppose there is no issue on  it but if there is a downward trend and the range of gap from the current price is wide then the question on stability is a big deal.

But in our country we are not really concerned about the fluctuations since we just convert out bitcoin to peso wallet then the value will not fluctuate anymore.

Bitcoin's price may fluctuate, but you have to see how much it fluctuates. If the fluctuation is less than say + or -1% a day, I would say that its price has stabilized. The problem right now is the Bitcoin's volatility is higher than most asset classes.

you are right, the stability of Bitcoin - a constant increase in prices. This currency is not subject to inflation - is also stable

It seems to me that the Bitcoin can not be stable. After all, it is based on supply and demand. And it is very unstable quantity. Fluctuations in the price of Bitcoin is its normal state

Bitcoin can not be stable like other currency because Bitcoin is still being developed and it is a new currency. There are many years ahead for Bitcoin to improve and be recognized by people.Since Bitcoin was created, its price has increase more than billions times and I can ensure that it will continue to increase until it become an international currency

Bitcoin was pretty stable during past several weeks. The difference between the highest and lowest prices always has been in the range of 5% during that period of time which is a very nice result for Bitcoin. I think if the price will go over $1,500 in one month then a huge drop is inevitable but if it will stay below that mark everything should be okay.

bitcoin is as stable as the water because this is a currency that is not been controlled by the government i think it is moving up to a system of decentralized model were you can move about with your money without the interference of the government ,because it is been controlled only by the miner in circulation.

There`s no way for bitcoin to replace all the fiat currencies.

Bitcoin is just an alternative.

By the way,we can print bitcoins and use them as paper money,so you don`t need electrcity and internet.

It will reach 1000 USD within next year for sure. Basing from what is happening today, the prices is really high now and we only need around $200 to reach $1,000 level. That is not so far away. If it rises around $1 a day then we only need 200 days to get to $1,000. I think it will rise and not fall anymore as more and more services are using Bitcoins. There is news that alibaba will use Bitcoin in the near future.

the price is stable but there is a sign for down before its move into higher but i think it will not reach 1000 us dollars and its too far before we can go for that price. i see on the poloniex, the sign give a new trend for the down and i hope its not down to deep because if this is happen then its really hard to get raise again.

its more stable than the past few years. and bitcoin is growing rapidly hoping that all of us would use bitcoin so we can make bitcoin price more higher today . until now im waiting till bitcoin reach 1000 us dollars because im buying bitcoin on my friends because they're giving me a low exchanged than the market. and im still waiting for the price range become more higher than today i think it would be stable for more 5 years.

When existing governments collapse, new forms of government will emerge. Bitcoin will lead to transformation processes that will improve the efficiency of services by whatever form government there will be. Even if we may go through transition periods with supply problems, not the whole world will have the same problem at the same time.

That said, even in a state of non-governance, electricity can still be available. The scenario OP painted implicitly assumes that the supply of energy is under the monopolized control of government. That is not true for many countries. Even without government, private companies can still sell electricity. In addition, decentral sources of energy are readily available, like solar energy or small wind generators.

ya.ya.yo!

As still majority of the people of the world do not know about bitcoin, and the users of bitcoin are continuously increasing, because the popularity of bitcoin is increasing every day, people are now getting confidence on bitcoin therefore they are investing their assets here, so the demand of bitcoin is increasing which increase the price of bitcoin.

Hope that when all the people of the world will start using bitcoin as currency then bitcoin will become more stable.

I doubt that current rise of bitcoin's price is more stable than previous price changing. Bitcoin changed it's price in every moment since the moment of it's creation. Only one period that was really stable to bitcoin's price I would call - it's the time after Bitfinex was hacked on August of this year. Remember the price almost didn't move in September. But bitcoin could came back from it and continued to move up.

this assumption is not right because nothing can replace the whole world's currencies since nobody is going to agree with that. besides bitcoin is not capable of doing that.


other things need electricity too, banks, ATMs, printing money,...
if we assume bitcoin replaces anything, it will also replace the power consumption by those things too.


government is not powerful with fiat, yes they are printing money but that doesn't mean anything in my opinion. you are overthinking things into chaos.

If we are talking about stability pertaining to bitcoin there are two things to consider. Bitcoins price and the second bitcoins existence.

Bitcoins price is not stable it is volatile, it constantly changing depending on the market trends.

Second is bitcoins existence, is it stable enough to survive long enough or it will die a few years from now. In m opinion, in this stage bitcoin is stable as it is beginning to expand and grow stronger everyday. So there are no question on its stability as it will stay on the market for a long time.

I think that the philosophy of Bitcoin is not aimed to bring anarchy, but to bring freedom of choice to people. When people perceive the damage that a centralized government can bring to the economy and to society, they will struggle for more decentralization.

Some people think that anarchy and chaos are the same thing but they are mistaken, anarchy is simply the lack of a central government telling us what to do while chaos is completely and outright disorder.

Yes, I too believe bitcoin will not disturb any government by any means because bitcoin has nothing to with politics and  people will not ignore their own country's economic improvements. But interestingly bitcoin will support strong individual financial improvements. So we never need to worry about political imbalances due to bitcoins.

The current rise in bitcoins price is more stable than its previous price changes. According to Tilleir, bitcoins previous price hikes were mysterious but the current one is due to the devaluation of chinas currency. Because this is a logical reason for the price surge, the market is acting  with a forward disounting mechanism and some degree of appreciation is now built into the price.

Government and society don't need to go into anarchy, I believe that the trend is to move to a decentralized governance model. Bitcoin itself is not an anarchic currency, because it is controled by miners, that's also a decentralized governance model.
It's not something that happens overnight, it would take decades for governments to begin such a transition.

I suppose if Bitcoin is to replace currencies, then governments are good with it (because they already found a way for people to pay taxes for using Bitcoin), people are already used to it, the governments are quite stable and thus electricity is stable as well and nothing bad happens. Even if some governments were unhappy, if they turn off the internet, many of their own technologies they need for CIA and stuff won't work and everybody will be too angry, so I think they would never do such a thing.

Yes the stability of bitcoin will be affected if is there is any interruption in Internet or in electricity. But we cannot expect a worldwide interruption. That is the reason bitcoin will have no problems on any circumstance.

There are countries which are having uninterrupted power supply for decades, one good example is Singapore.

In regards to number 2, I don't find the argument convincing. We have too many real world examples of this for a logical argument to refute it. Look at areas where there is a weak government or weak rule of law. There are often factions that grow large enough to operate as a quasi-government and they are rarely fair or stable. Arbitrary law rules these organizations. (Drug cartels are a good example, ISIS, Farc, Yemeni warlords, Boko Harem, etc.) These are the groups that come to power in anarchistic settings.

I think that Bitcoin will never be stable. This is its specificity. He is not subject to the laws of economics. It is interesting for many investors, which means that its price will fluctuate always

This exactly true, there's no real stable currency, however in bitcoin price movement level, this year is the stable period which it's not really significant swing chart.

Anyway this is good for bitcoin at this stable level , it's provided if between buyer and seller is most equal. I have been predicted since I sell my coin and want to buy back at lower price, but it's become harder to predict.

An end of this planet Earth's stability may be an end to bitcoin's too, till then I guess we need not to worry about electricity nor internet interruptions.

Also I am not ready to agree that governments go unstable / collapsed due to introduction of a new payment system, as long as governments are able to impose and collect taxes (not just on bitcoins), they will survive and rule.

This thread is already 6 years now and it somehow bump again on this year which is like grave digging theres no need to activate such thread.
We can all witness now after 6 years of bitcoins existence and we could say that bitcoin isnt still stable after all these years because price do really tend to move because lots already of people do engage with it.

Actually bitcoin wont replace currencies because some problems of bitcoin is facing. First, it has no physicality. Second, you need electricity and internet to use it. Third, its unstable. The price can crash anytime. Bitcoin can be useful for investments. It wont replace any currency but it can be use as subtitute.

If bitcoin price stable is not good
because if bitcoin price stable you can't trading again, you can't to find profit from trading bitcoin

Bitcoin is a great currency that ensures that your wealth with have mostly preserved value as long as the basic functions of the internet are operating and society hasn't collapsed completely. If society does collapse, you best have tangible goods with real value (seeds, tools, etc.) instead of Bitcoin, and next best is gold or silver.

It really depends on what could go wrong.

There are always ways to run your own Internet and electric system so don't worry about that. If there is the Dark Age, experts, Anonymous hacker team and other people will teach us how to survive after this disaster. However, it can barely happen. We are living in the technological and globalization world which countries adapt with any kind of situation. Cryptocurrencies can not destroy the whole system, it can only help to build the better place to live

in the past few months the bitcoin's price was very stable and i think it is going to stay stable for quite some time which is good because this will make investors trust this currency more and we might see it becoming used everywhere on the internet , it is true that we can't replace real money with bitcoin because if there is no internet there is no bitcoin but as long it exist as long we will see bitcoin

in the past few years there have been unprecedented stability in bitcoin as a financial instrument. It has been more stable than ever before, which has increased more trust in the currency. well large price increases have always been preceded by a stable period and now we’ve experienced the most stable period so far.

You use "I" the pronoun for a single individual to refer "the government" a noun that represents representatives from 50 different states, numerous interacting, and sometimes competing, regulatory agencies and independent bodies.  I know some people believe that the entire government moves with a single will, controlled by a single individual or a shadowy cabal, but I have not seen convincing evidence for this.  Instead I see the tyrannies and injustices of governments as natural products of our current democratic system and way of living.  I also believe many tyrannies and injustices do not spawn from malicious intent and that the people who support or implement them are merely misguided, not evil.  This is why I beleive the internet will not be shut down by the government, even if it means they have to start begging for money instead of taking it by force (the government can be very good at begging).   

It is this belief that tyranny is a natural product of certain "sociological algorithms" that leads me to support bitcoin and other, what i guess could be called "agorist" solutions.  Solutions that don't try to fight the system or even change it (these rarely work out), but instead, try to change a few of the inputs to the "sociological algorithm" and thus, change the output. 

Thanks for the links, I'm reading some of them.  But, let me just say what I'm thinking.  First of all, this thread is considering reasonably improbable long-term outcomes to this bitcoin experiment.  I say reasonably improbable because there will be powerful governments that will do their utmost to prevent changes to the economic status quo.  Just look at Iraq (http://www.rense.com/general34/realre.htm).  So I'm gonna put myself in the shoes of big brother, and here's what I'd do.

I'd switch of the internet - it would cause big problems for me, but perhaps less than bitcoin (or whatever).
I'd buy as many bitcoins as possible - not to destroy them, but to control as much of the underground economy as possible, obviously, I can just print more $crap to buy them with.
Usual scare tactics ("Anarchists seek to destroy economy" etc headlines).
Men in black to seek you out and "convince" you of the error or your ways.


But then, that's not the real problem as I see it.  Democracy is not such a stable form of government.  Any type of regulation always calls for more regulation right?  Eventually it turns into socialism/authoritarian.  Even now, western democracy is turning into a corporate aristocracy.  But, you know what, that's more stable to perturbation.  If a libertarian comes to an authoritarian state, he just has to bend over 'cos there's nothing he can do.

But, if an authoritarian comes to a libertarian state, well he can do lots.  He just needs to gain some power at the start, and he can subjugate others to his will.  And then... authoritarian micro-states!  You can't get rid of a thug unless you become one, and then suddenly we're all thugs and life is reduced to Hobbes' "brutish existence".

What I mean is, libertarianism works fine as long as *everyone* is a libertarian. A minority of authoritarians will destroy it. On the contrary, authoritarianism works fine, it can even be *ruled* by a minority.

>>But, there's a big problem here, bitcoin requires electricity and global internet to function well, and these kinds of services probably won't be so stable without working government

False premise.

This e-book by David Friedman (son of Milton Friedman) provides the following:

1. Real world examples of how private enterprise has successfully provided the same services as a government i.e. courts, police, utilities, etc.

2. A precise, logic-based refutation of the idea that anarchy would simply lead to the strongest criminal thugs forming a new government

3. A reduction of many common arguments for the governments existence to absurdity.

It can be found here: http://lectormatic.freeiz.com/machoffreedom/Friedman,_David_-_The_Machinery_of_Freedom.html

Welcome XC

Interesting links.

Thanks.

Welcome fergalish

Bitcoins will 'never' replace other 'world currencies'. That's a bit like suggesting that PayPal will replace the USD or that Gold will replace Oil or that credit cards will replace paper money. They are just not the same thing, however which ever way you look at it they all help the world go around. Bitcoins are just another currency.

Yes Bitcoin requires electricity and the internet to function. However, this hopefully doesn't rely only on Governments, you are ignoring Capitalism, the 'Corporation' and the free market. Are you suggesting that Bitcoin runs on the cypher net ?  

Anarchy ? That's wishful thinking ! Such is the price of progress... lol

I recommend Murray Rothbard's For a New Liberty, a full overview of how an anarcho-capitalist society would work.
http://mises.org/rothbard/newlibertywhole.asp

It's all in there and available for free (mp3 audio book, full text). 

After that you might try Konkin's New Libertarian Manifesto on Agorism.
http://www.agorism.info/NewLibertarianManifesto.pdf (Full text)
http://www.nostate.com/2111/new-libertarian-manifesto-audio-mp3-podcast/ (Audio book)

Agorism is more the tactical and strategic means of actually getting to an anarcho-capitalist society.

XC

So, supposing bitcoin, or some variant, manages to completely replace the world's currencies.  This will certainly make some governments unstable, some might well collapse - see http://freedomainradio.com/board/forums/t/19983.aspx

But, there's a big problem here, bitcoin requires electricity and global internet to function well, and these kinds of services probably won't be so stable without working government.

So... bitcoin substitutes currency, government is destabilized, society descends (or ascends?) into anarcy, electricity & internet become unstable, society descends into the next dark age.  Has anyone thought about that?