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I saw Instawallet which seems like a pretty easy
I saw Instawallet which seems like a pretty easy
Yes. It is definitely easy.
and safe way to do casual transactions
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Whoa! No way. Absolutely not. There is nothing "safe" about Instawallet. The only thing that makes them usable at all is a history of apparently working properly most of the time.
When you use InstaWallet, you are handing your money over to a complete stranger. The moment any bitcoins are sent to any InstaWallet address, it ceases to be "your bitcoins" and immediately becomes the property of InstaWallet. You are trusting that this complete stranger that you have never met and know nothing about will hopefully honor your requests when you ask them to send those bitcoins elsewhere.
Imagine you are walking down the street. You pass someone with a card table set up on the corner. They have a sign out that says "I'll keep track of your money for you". You read one of the pamphlets they have printed up themselves and have laying around on the table. The pamphlet explains that they are not insured, and they are not regulated by any government agency. Their "business" may or may not continue to exist tomorrow, and you may or may not still find them on that street corner. The pamphlet suggests that you take the cash out of the wallet in your back pocket and hand it over to the person standing behind the table. That person will give you a card with a unique number written on it. Anytime you call up a particular phone number, and identify yourself with the unique number on the card, you can ask them to deliver that cash anywhere you like (including back to yourself). The pamphlet explains that this service is provided entirely free of charge, and anyone who happens to get a hold of that unique number can pretend to be you and they will honor that person's requests as if they were you.
Do you empty out your wallet and hand them the cash? Do you give them any cash at all? Do you have faith that they will honor all your requests to deliver the cash? Do you have faith that they will continue to run this "free" business and not disappear once they have collected enough cash? Do you look at them and wonder what sort of fool actually hands over the cash from their wallet to this completely unknown stranger running what appears to be a very odd business?
Of course seeing the advice might not have helped anyhow. Some follow up posts in that same thread:
I have been using Instawallet since I first got into Bitcoins. People who tell you not to use it honestly just want to wow you with their knowledge of bitcoins.
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I just point out that it is as safe as handing over your cash to a complete stranger and hoping that they are still there to give it back to you in the future when you ask for it.
How can one engage in online money transfers without involving strangers at some point in the transaction?Although I never used them that analogy is not quite accurate. It's not like handing money to a random stranger around the corner. More like trusting a known dealer. Sure, if you trust someone there is the possibility that that trust s betrayed. That is the definition of trust.
Is instawallet a good entity to trust money? I would say, they appear to be a serious website
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Is instawallet a good entity to trust money? I would say, they appear to be a serious website
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