Is this Bitcoin's achilles heel? - page 2.

grondilu

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Quote from: blockbet.net on April 03, 2013, 05:59:09 PM

Quote from: yvv on April 03, 2013, 05:11:42 PM

The problem is that if some guy manages to get 51% of all bitcoins in his hands (difficult, but possible), and bitcoin value sky rockets such that few satoshis are enough for living, that guy can buy your ass into life-time anal slavery for a tiny fraction of his assets.

Why would that be a problem, exactly? Is it wrong to be rich? That shouldn't affect the rest of us one bit.

Also, the wealth of this person would existsonly because some people would be willing to offer goods and services for those satoshis. Therefore talking about "anal slavery" is totally inappropriate. A slave is someone who is forced to obey, not someone who willingly contributes to an economic exchange.

blockbet.net

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Admin at blockbet.net

Quote from: yvv on April 03, 2013, 05:11:42 PM

The problem is that if some guy manages to get 51% of all bitcoins in his hands (difficult, but possible), and bitcoin value sky rockets such that few satoshis are enough for living, that guy can buy your ass into life-time anal slavery for a tiny fraction of his assets.

Why would that be a problem, exactly? Is it wrong to be rich? That shouldn't affect the rest of us one bit.

grondilu

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The OP should learn about what a corner is and how it is not as easy as one might think.

Quote

Although there have been many attempts to corner markets by massive purchases in everything from tin to cattle, to date very few of these attempts have ever succeeded; instead, most of these attempted corners have tended to break themselves spontaneously. Indeed, as long ago as 1923, Edwin Lefèvre wrote, "very few of the great corners were profitable to the engineers of them."[2] A cornerer can become vulnerable due to the size of the position, especially if the attempt becomes widely known. If the rest of the market senses weakness, it may resist any attempt to artificially drive the market any further by actively taking opposing positions. If the price starts to move against the cornerer, any attempt by the cornerer to sell would likely cause the price to drop substantially. In such a situation, many other parties could profit from the cornerer's need to unwind the position.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornering_the_market

wopwop

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Quote from: yvv on April 03, 2013, 05:43:06 PM

Quote from: Zomdifros on April 03, 2013, 05:25:20 PM

Why is this discussion still going on?

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/FAQ#What_if_someone_bought_up_all_the_existing_Bitcoins.3F

Thanks, this clears the question up.

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This situation doesn't suggest, however, that the markets aren't vulnerable to price manipulation. It doesn't take significant amounts of money to move the market price up or down and thus Bitcoin remains a volatile asset.

Flawed by design. Guess, who is going to manipulate the market after all?

mt.gox

they have the most to lose

yvv

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Quote from: Zomdifros on April 03, 2013, 05:25:20 PM

Why is this discussion still going on?

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/FAQ#What_if_someone_bought_up_all_the_existing_Bitcoins.3F

Thanks, this clears the question up.

Quote

This situation doesn't suggest, however, that the markets aren't vulnerable to price manipulation. It doesn't take significant amounts of money to move the market price up or down and thus Bitcoin remains a volatile asset.

Flawed by design. Guess, who is going to manipulate the market after all?

Zomdifros

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Why is this discussion still going on?

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/FAQ#What_if_someone_bought_up_all_the_existing_Bitcoins.3F

wopwop

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bitcoin needs an continious and ever increasing (if usage increases) Energy inflow that someone must pay for

yvv

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Quote from: conspirosphere.tk on April 03, 2013, 04:07:38 PM

The price can stay high/go higher until the influx of suckers ...er, buyers persists. Then the music stops. Moreover at any time the manipulator lose its control/property of any coin he sells/profit from.

The problem is that if some guy manages to get 51% of all bitcoins in his hands (difficult, but possible), and bitcoin value sky rockets such that few satoshis are enough for living, that guy can buy your ass into life-time anal slavery for a tiny fraction of his assets.

Quote

Of course, if the manipulator has a money printer things could become interesting...

Yeah, such things are really interesting. Is not the original goal of bitcoin (and other alt-money) to make such things impossible?

conspirosphere.tk

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Bitcoin is antisemitic

Quote from: yvv on April 03, 2013, 04:00:22 PM

But this is exactly what you want to do to fuck up the community. You buy a lot, while bitcoins are cheap -> btc rate sky rockets -> you make profit, and others suck because they can not buy cheap btc anymore.

The price can stay high/go higher until the influx of suckers ...er, buyers persists. Then the music stops. Moreover at any time the manipulator lose its control/property of any coin he sells/profit from. Of course, if the manipulator has a money printer things could become interesting...

GernMiester

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They would also have to grab the entire BTC network to ensure no new coins fell into the "wrong" hands.

yvv

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Quote from: RodeoX on April 03, 2013, 03:18:46 PM

Besides, as I bought up the coins the price would rise creating even more demand and encouraging more hording.

But this is exactly what you want to do to fuck up the community. You buy a lot, while bitcoins are cheap -> btc rate sky rockets -> you make profit, and others suck because they can not buy cheap btc anymore.

yvv

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You don't need to buy all bitcoins to screw up the system. You just need to have more btc than anybody else. Then you can take control over major bitcoin services, manipulate exchange rates and do a lot of other bad things, making profit out of this. And if somebody forks bitcoin-2.0 (there are a bunch of them already out there), just spend some of btc-1.0 to get as much btc-2.0 as possible, while they are cheap, and screw up bitcoin-2.0 for profit too.

99bitcoins

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Quote from: RodeoX on April 03, 2013, 03:02:47 PM

Rich people look for opportunities to make money not spend money.

We're talking riches beyond your wildest dreams my friend Wink

yvv

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Quote from: kerogre256 on April 03, 2013, 04:49:15 AM

At the moment there is about 40 000 bitcoin available on 'visible' market if they buy all of them price will sky rocket ....

Is not this exactly what is happening lately?

mai77

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Quote from: 99bitcoins on April 03, 2013, 04:12:32 AM

What do you guys think?

I think how can u think no one thought of that before.

what a misleading headline of yours

nwbitcoin

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You are a geek if you are too early to the party!

Theoretically, you could buy as many as possible, and then sell them as low as you can, crashing the market. For instance, if you were to buy a million coins, and just set up thousands of selling orders for $1 that would crash the market, leaving people with a lot of doubt over their stability, which is enough to scare the big boys away.

It doesn't matter if geeks are still using them, its normal society that they want to scare off!

RodeoX

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The revolution will be monetized!

Quote from: 99bitcoins on April 03, 2013, 03:13:22 PM

Quote from: RodeoX on April 03, 2013, 03:02:47 PM

So if I bought up all the coins it would cost me many millions of dollars. Once only I have them they are worth nothing. Why would I do that?

Because you have more money than you can ever use or want and your motivations are to destroy Bitcoin for one reason or another.

But what motive could I possibly have? I would not be rich if I wasted my money so easily. Besides, as I bought up the coins the price would rise creating even more demand and encouraging more hording. It would be spectacularly expensive to even buy 10% of the market.
Rich people look for opportunities to make money not spend money.

99bitcoins

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Quote from: RodeoX on April 03, 2013, 03:02:47 PM

So if I bought up all the coins it would cost me many millions of dollars. Once only I have them they are worth nothing. Why would I do that?

Because you have more money than you can ever use or want and your motivations are to destroy Bitcoin for one reason or another.

RodeoX

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The revolution will be monetized!

So if I bought up all the coins it would cost me many millions of dollars. Once only I have them they are worth nothing. Why would I do that?

Gordonium

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Quote from: 99bitcoins on April 03, 2013, 02:54:57 PM

Quote from: Gordonium on April 03, 2013, 02:46:49 PM

Quote from: 99bitcoins on April 03, 2013, 02:19:33 PM

How about a proper rebuttal, rather than name-calling? Of course we can always resort to handy little ~~LOL-MEMES~~ TROLL-MEMES when tough questions arise right? Wink

Do you know that you can divide Bitcoins? Even if someone would by 99.99% Bitcoins the whole global trade could be done with that 00.01%. Althought the whole scenario is as plausible as asking what if somebody buys all the food from the world or something like that...

Yes, assuming the attacker wouldn't buy and sell them 10 second intervals we can carry on with one bitcoin or even .000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000001 bitcoin for the entire universe.

The whole scenario is as plausible as someone buying all the dollars out of market faster than Bernanke and the boys can print more. I am pretty sure that you don't worry about that scenario very much, and that's for a good reason: It is impossible. Same with Bitcoins.

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