Topic: If confirmation takes 10 minutes, how will I buy coffee at Starbucks? - page 4. (Read 9938 times)

I think you're all missing the point here.

If cryptocurrencies ever end up being used at the point of sale, don't think for a moment that those transactions are going to be hitting the blockchain directly.

Look at how todays cryptocurrency exchanges work. You can spend BTC, LTC,  PPC, XPM, WDC - whatever. All those trades are instant (if your not on cryptsy ! ). They have nothing to do with the confirmation time of the respective coin.

That's because your not actually doing blockchain transactions - your spending from a cryptocurrency account.

That's the way the retail economy works today out in the real world and that's the way it will always work. Transaction clearing houses like Visa and Maestro get the "trade" out of the way quickly for the vendor, then clear the transaction through the banks over the next few hours. It will continue to work this way except that instead of USD accounts you'll be spending BTC / LTC whatever on your credit/debit card.

Another reason that direct blockchain transaction will never be used at the point of sale is that they are far too inflexible. Doing the sale from an account through a clearing house allows for all kinds of problems to be resolved befor the transaction hits the blockchain - e.g. reversals, refunds, revisions. They also provide value added services like insuring the transaction, use of store cards etc etc.

That was my point in an earlier thread I made about coin transaction time. I don't really see the point in so called "fast coins". A 10 minute blockchain confirmation time is way fast enough. At the moment the banks take hours or days to clear transactions.

You are just jealous they have the rights to the name Starbucks and you can't name your Altcoin that

Another serious issue and its dismissed as trivial and nothing to worry about. 

What will happen, just like with cards if you like, large chains might absorb the losses but the small shops after being burnt a few times wont accept Bitcoins.  You think someone wont double spend for a coffee?  You'd think they wouldn't use a stolen card, or fake money, yet they do.  Anyway, a coffee is a poor example as with their unit cost they can ignore it, most shops would want to wait for confirmation, just like they wait for the card terminal to respond. 

Which gets me thinking that maybe Starbucks ought to have some kind of protection if a transaction is going to take a long time (10 minutes), and buyers ought to have code on their mobile device wallet that communicates with the Starbucks client to insure that it is a part of the network.

Yes i read the thread, I usually pick the shorter ones to post in, I have read arguments about double spending and it seems to be very difficult, the common thief has not yet been sold the wallets to double spend with, given time they will come, I have read alot of arguments and anything I say should only be taken as my opinion as a "what if" based on my perception.

Do you ever make transactions that you expect to take 30 seconds?

Ever buy anything in such a rush that you were unable to wait for your change?

how easy is it to spot a double spend? Is it possible to have a program on your cell phone that looks like a legit wallet but can quickly produce an address that is similar to one that is attached to a QR code? such a program could remove the double spend and would be outright theft, i would much rather a quick confirmation if I am selling something on a busy street

Did you read the other posts in this thread or look more deeply into the double spend issue before posting that?

Double spends: difficult to attempt, easy to spot.
 

watching alt coins and the work developers are putting into faster confirmations, it truly makes sense that bitcoin was developed as more of a security or commodity than a currency, I wont promote any specific coin on this thread, but  look at the possibility's out there, satoshi (or whoever) could not have built this coin without pondering where it actually would end up, everything I see tells me that it is just the foundation of a crypto financial system, he knew others would follow and bring innovation with them, with this in mind, if your trying to replace fiat and your on your way into a ballpark, do you want to stop and wait for a transaction to be confirmed before the guy scalping tickets releases them to you?-no- many things we buy in -  . . . - are on the go, system flaws and hackers tell me that I need a debit like system if I am going to use crypto currency, Starbucks may not mind protecting itself against a double spend multi wallet criminal, but the guy with 10 minutes in his busy life on craigslist is not really going to want to adopt the policy of the corporations of the world just cause their system works for them, find the altcoin that is most secure, fast, and is close to the fiat or currency we have used for century's and lets move on with this decentralized currency idea that has somehow attached itself to BTC.

P.S. Buy more pizza with BTC

Looking at it from their point of view, when the government slaps them with a 60% tax rate can you really blame them for trying to worm their way out of it? Taxes are at the point where they're just ridiculous, and everyone tries to cheat on them as a result.

Right, and the answer is to end the regulations and taxes.

The problem with uneven oppression is not that certain people aren't oppressed enough.

I think everything that needs to be said has already been said about the OP's question.  I just wanted to comment concerning Starbucks and tax.

We shouldn't be celebrating crony capitalism.  Regulations and taxes that are selectively enforced against smaller competitors to the mega-corps are not better than regulations and taxes that apply to everyone.

Well i guess the kids that will try to double spend their coffee they will not get that hurt if their double spend attempt fails. I think people will try it only for fun anyway. Regular customers that do that will get noticed anyway.

Then it won't work.  The longer you wait to push the second fraudulent transaction, the more likely it is that the real transaction has already propagated across the network (and thus the fraudulent transaction will just be ignored).

You can confirm this for yourself.  http://brainwallet.org/#tx allows you to create transactions (without broadcasting them onto the network).  Send a single coin to a new address you control.  Use http://brainwallet.org/#tx and this new address to create two transactions: one to address A and one to address B.  (Make sure you control both address A and B).  Go to https://blockchain.info/pushtx and broadcast the transaction to address A.  Wait till it's picked up by the network (should be really fast).  Now, wait the amount of time it takes to leave the store with your coffee and then broadcast (double spend) the second transaction to address B.  You'll see that it won't go through.

Bitcoins are for pizzas!

I don't care for the occupy movement either, but I think you've got to be a capitalist pig to think it's ok for multi billion dollar companies to get away with paying zero tax whilst the ordinary citizen foots the bill.

I guess that they 'll try to double spend after they take their coffee.  I mean how long does it take to get a coffee from starbucks 

Preorder, or realize that BTC is going to become a commodity and not a currency with all the other options that transfer faster, buy into those that transfer faster with your BTC and stop worrying about yo.
i cant buy nothing with an oz of gold, yet i can trade it off for USD and nobody refuses that  

Pissing off occutards should be applauded indeed.

This.  I don't care much for Charbucks, but if they have the Occutards pissed off at them, more power to 'em.

And remember, double-spends are recognized by the network and thus also recognizable by the merchant before they give you your coffee.  For example, blockchain.info will show a big "DOUBLE SPEND DETECTED" warning should someone actually go through the process of building a custom "double spend" wallet app for their phone.  


TLDR: it's hard to double spend but easy to catch.  If you try it, you'll get caught before you leave with your coffee and look like a scammer.

I think it's the same risk as accepting small fake bills. It just don't worth the trouble imho to double spend a coffee buy.