I think since already we are exchanging goods for bitcoins, then it will continue in the future. It is already an economy. The good think is that you cannot really forge it. So it is valuable, like gold or more. People will be aggregating it. I think people like the idea of independence of it - it is like cash or better. There are of course some shady deals and money laundering going on. Probably this is what fuels part of the transactions. I think introduction of asics will cause volatility until all gpu miners will go out of business.
Why do you think ASICs can cause volatility, it will not change supply of bitcoins.
LOL @ people who still think mining has a significant effect on price despite being an insignificant % of total supply. Don't question them, you'll make them think too hard
Ok, here's what it does affect
-The value of ASIC-related stocks on MPeX and others
-ATI's warehouse/sales managers finally get a day off
-A teeny, teeny, teeny, tiny bit of the total supply
-Ok, that teeny bit is a little more concentrated since the total number of peeps mining probably took a little slide but it's not like you have to be a megamillionaire to afford the lowest model ASIC so none of this super-rich 1%-who-can-afford-an-ASIC miners taking over the network crap
In hindsight, you actually may be right. I am not sure. Just concerned about two things which may happen:
1) difficulty goes up in response to increase in hashing rate because of ASICs, this causes GPU people to stop mining (electricity costs). This will create a drop in the supply, although this will be probably overcome by ASIC users in long term. However now, ASICs are also in limited supply. So, short-term spike in price.
2) ASIC users after mining as much as possible in first few weeks, will try to cash in on high bitcoin price and we will see drop in the long term.
The rate of production and behavior of producers is not irrelevant. Sure, it is only part of coins in circulation, but the current high price for bitcoin is most likely caused by halving the reward.
I bet it is hard to put everything into equation, just as difficult it is to model real markets. So I am not sure how it will turn out. But very curious about it.
The good thing is that we will have a supply of cheap video cards soon. I am looking to pick up 7970.