Topic: Where is Bitcoin in the Technology adoption lifecycle? (Read 13144 times)

Mainstream media has been taking about Bitcoin a lot more in 2014. Last year the few times it was mentioned it was always almost only a joke or a scam.

Large corporations like Dish and Dell are starting to accept Bitcoin as a payment through Coinbase and Bitpay, as well as smaller but still very big businesses like Overstock, Tiger Direct, and New Egg. Younger businesses like Shopify "get it".

I think we are approaching "The Chasm". I'm a 20-something in a college city. This year I have instigated friends of mine to purchase over $50,000 in Bitcoin. They see it as an opportunity to invest in the future once they really start to understand it. I work in coffee. None of those friends are tech oriented. They are the second generation - and when they make some money from this investment I think THEY will be the catalyst for the post Chasm early adopters and early majority.

We're, given my view transitioning from innovator stage to early adopter stage now. My views have evolved and aren't set in stone. Sometimes I read something and I feel a little like a laggard.

Remember Bitcoin is many things to many people so each function served by Bitcoin has a similar normal distribution / adoption curve and not every function grows at the same rate.

That is why I think 2014 is still early adopters.

I can't believe there was a discussion like this in 2012 while a majority of the world had not even HEARD of bitcoin, let alone adopt it.

early addopters for sure

I see it more as personally types.
The innovators are pragmatic, they are still joining they join this revolution by learning and contributing to Altcoins or new Bitcoin tools and infrastructure. The early adopters are the bitpay's and overstock.com's of the world. 

The early majority will be the average consumer the ones that come after Barry Silbert's third wave.

I think we are close to the chasm, not there yet but close.

This can be a tool to get more people into bitcoin,
But we as a community need to agree on the dates and then promote it.

Innovators: 2009 - 2010
Early adopters:2011 - 2014
Early majority: 2015 - ?
Late majority: ?
Laggards: ?

It's fair. What stops you from earning thousands of Bitcoins and if you can earn or buy thousands you're an early adopter. Thousands of Bitcoins would make you a Bitcoin millionaire or even Billionaire. So we are still early adopters while the price is under $100 or under $1000. When it's over $1000 then you wont be able to afford 1000BTC. Right now you can afford 1000BTC but its harder than when BTC was $2 a coin.

I think of it as a technology, not a culture. Just like farming, or using money are technologies that had huge cultural effects, in my view it was the technology that culture.
I agree there is a little culture in this early phase - I see Bitcoin being called nerds gold.

Bitcoin isn't like a new product or technology, but a way of doing things. It's more like a culture. AFAIK there is no such thing as a "culture adoption curve." Right now it's very counter-cultural and some are calling it a fad. In some circles it's very fashionable and in vogue and in others it looks silly, mawkish, even outdated.

Of course it transcends culture in some ways, but not many. It will only reach people who value what this way of doing things has to offer.

bump

Please vote/ update your vote - comment.
I am wanting to share the users market sentiment, also - please read the OP as there is a lot about Bitcoin there what I think is bullish.

Statistically 15% of total users are classified as Early Adopters, my question is do you see the noobs as laggards or early adopters in a bigger picture?

I would say the innovation stage for sure - bitcoin is in its infancy and has a very, very, very long way to go. The fact it is planned out until 2140 is far more foresighted than any currency issued by a government!

In terms of the humanistic benefits of cryptocurrency (which I believe in) do not forget LTC and TRC which will also grow and most likely spread to more people

So how is it that:

@ Spaceman_Spiff
I agree with your reasoning, I seem to value the merits differently, It is going to be fun watching Bitcoin evolve.

Judging the relevance of your statement, it looks like you are pedaling snake oil.  This discussion should continue under speculation. 

Any one in there right mined who would invest in developing dedicated Bitcoin ASIC's, would be expected to profit from mining Bitcoin's before they shipped hardware, to competitors. 

Judging by your BFL signature i would guess you do not have an asic yet

As long as late adopters see benefits in adopting bitcoin use (and like I said before, I think spreads and fees will drop with increased usage), why shouldn't they do it?  If their transaction fees are lower, and there is no reason why the exchange rate should drop, what is the rationale for not adopting it?  Who will give a rats ass about transfering wealth to early adopters as long as there is personal gain in it for them?  And even if a subset of these are very ideological people , are they that much happier continually transfering wealth to traditional banks or central banks?  

It isn't about chasing 'tokens' for the sake of amassing more.

Bitcoin is a system that isn't beholden to the banking infrastructure. Alliances aside, bitcoin is more about monetary freedom. If I was presumptuous enough, I'd craft a "Declaration of Monetary Independence". That is how important this tool is. It isn't about how many yachts you can ski behind.

The disruptive nature of a freely tradeable and non-regulated(ie., MANIPULATED) financial system is worth so much.

It is one of the most important advances of our age. I firmly believe that.

I care, I hope to be one of them, I just think it is too soon to count my chickens, and if I think it is too good to be true, then it probably is. I just want to believe. I need someone to explain to me why all these people are going to adopt Bitcoin in exchange for wealth, my post above give what I believe are good reasons not to, but I am happy to wait and see, just looking for some understanding. 

If bitcoin makes a few people (dollar) billionaires, so what?
There are over 400-500 billionaires on this planet, maybe even more. Who cares if some bitcoiners will be billionaires, or do you think facebook is worth more than bitcoin? 

it's this perceived value that is the problem, I preserve 1 satoshi is worth between $1 and $0.10 at some point in the future. My perception isn't good for the economy, (a lot of productive work must be done before I part with my precious satoshi)

This value you outline is real, I don't accept credit cards because 2.5% of my income goes to the bank. But that said that value is somewhere between 1 and 3%. The exchange I use to buy and sell Bitcoins charges between 1 and 3% and the market difference between buy and sell can be as high as a few present.  In reality the rational incentive to use BTC is small.

I don't think it is rational to put all your savings into BTC, but I do think it is rational to put a percentage of savings you are willing to lose into Bitcoin and see what happens, my thought is most of the Value in the BTC market cap is speculative.

I agree the economy is developing, but much slower than the market cap is increasing.  I can't see the BTC - Fiat exchange stabilising, until all Bitcoin is evenly distributed.

 (if BTC is a medium of exchange, then I should exchange it for something I preserve to be of equal value) The real value of BTC is in the technology (unquantifiable but everyone will benefit if we all use it) and some of the value is in the reduced fees, quantifiable, but not significant enough to warrant the risks of switching to BTC.  

Though experiment: Now say I have BTC50,000 (I deserve it, I was an innovator/early adopter) the quantifiable value is: this is a medium of exchange, (fair enough, cool we can use it to exchange if I get you to believe it is good for tracking exchanges)  it is +-1% more efficient that the existing system, and can't be inflated. (That is great this could be worth $1,000 a year to you. ) To realise that $1000 value, you will need to triad $100,000 worth of your material good and labour. I'll sell you 10BTC for $0.02, (you ask what I can buy with this, I say you need another 9,990 and you can buy a pizza.)  Now somewhere around 10,000 people are interested in Bitcoin, and you get 1BTC for $13 if anyone of those people is to realise $1000 worth of benefit they have to invest $100,000 into the BTC economy, if all 10,000 members did that the BTC market cap would be worth $1,000,000,000, now we have BTC10,000,000 in existence today so my BTC50,000 will have a value of $5,000,000. The value I have provided is just $1,000 in efficiency over the existing system as an innovator/ early adopter.  But I get to exchange as if I have provided 5,000 times that value.  

My conclusion is 50 years of slavery to realise $1000 in value, (no way) the distribution of BTC is problematic. A disproportionate amount of wealth goes to too few for providing only marginal benefit. (a stable exchange rate only guarantees  a disproportionate amount of wealth goes a few, while a crash with exstended periods of dispair may better distribute the BTC)

I see BTC 2.0 solving this problem, like the Americans solved the problem of England's gold monopoly by using silver. The distribution of BTC is worse that the gold monopoly problems leading up to the American war of independence. (to my recollection,  the British had a virtual monopoly on gold, and required Americans to pay triad taxes in gold, hence the tea party).  

Like I said in another post, I don't think the lack of regression theorem applicability is a problem.
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.1357230
'Not backed by barter' this depends a bit on what you mean.  No, bitcoins indeed do not have an intrinsic non-monetary use like commodities do. But they are exchangeable for other goods (depending on perceived value).

I do think there is a rational incentive to use BTCs currently if the fees are smaller than using traditional systems (especially in international transactions, or if you are unable to pay in another way due to circumstances, like an underdeveloped banking system in your home land or something similar).
 
If everybody thinks BTCs will increase in value, then they will trade all their fiat money for BTCs and buy their required goods with BTCs.  They won't keep a portion of their savings in BTC and spend dollars and euros for goods, I mean, what is the use of holding spare fiat money in this case?  

Bitcoin currently has a problem for merchants in that its exchange rate is still extremely volatile (due to the small market cap), so this is a problem to price their goods in BTC, and to keep BTCs for expenses.  The logical intermediary step towards broader adoption is pricing in USD or euro or..., converting that to BTC values, transfer in BTC and use services like bitpay to immediately convert back to conventional currencies.  As this practice grows, fees should drop (and exchange rate spreads should drop too).  When BTCs eventually reach a more stable exchange rate, people can just trade in BTCs and keep them without needing to convert.

Agreed, but I think the development of the economy is possible (and happening).

OK, but we are not dealing with the regression money theorem here. So we are not evolving an economy backed by barter.

Here is an example: lets agree to trade in BTC the exchange to Fiat is $10 to BTC1.
Now I give you 30 days to pay, and 30 days from now Fiat is $20 to BTC1.
The seller will have lost 50% on the deal and the buyer up 50%. (As btc increase in value relative to Fiat a buyer - people with btc - will have an advantage. This advantage will be expressed as a reluctance to sell goods and services in btc.

So if the trend is up it favors the btc holder.

If the btc is always traded for service in the btc economy. We would use gdp to measure growth and Austrian business principles to value goods and services. (Growth comes from within)

But because there is  a demand for btc  outside of the btc economy the value of btc will increase. As long as the value is increasing there is no insensitive for the economy to develop. Without an economy - trading of goods and services - there is nothing backing up the value of btc.

I don't agree with you here.  A rise in price will generally be accompanied by an increased amount of people believing bitcoin has value.  The more people use bitcoins for commerce or consider it to be a good store of value, the more truly valuable bitcoins become, as they can now be used as a medium of exchange between more individuals.  It's a positive feedback loop.

As stated this is all correlated, and general,
If the adoption lifecycle starts at a rate of 0 adopters and reflects an adoption rate, adoption increases to a point and then diminishes and stops when the rate of adoption reaches 0 again. When looking at that rate overtime a pattern emerges, and that adoption pattern is well studied.  In essence when looking back and analysing the history, you can tell at what point the technology started to take off, and it is at about +- 15%. Bitcoin can grow really big if the world population could be a target.  Some technologies adoption rate stops because it becomes ubiquitous like the wheel (it isn't adopted as a technology anymore because adoption is 100%) while some technologies adoption rate stops because it is superseded by a new technology look at palm OS for example.) 

Bitcoin has the potential to supersede gold and Fiat if it gains traction or it can just be a failed idea, and be left in the dust, or it could find a special niche.

My interest is, is Bitcoin an idea that will rival gold and Fiat, or will it supersede it, or will it die and fail.

Bitcoin adoption is critical to success, so I hear a lot of talk about early adopters should benefit, and I agree with the sentiment. As discussed elsewhere there is a paradox at play that is inhibiting economic growth in the BTC economy.  In conclusion Bitcoin's growth is in essence driven by people who understand the potential benefit the technology will deliver and see the problem with the current Fiat system.  (not from people doing business in bitcoin)

So is it going to go big? In which case everyone who has invested in Bitcoin to date is an early adopter and will be reworded handsomely you will then need to believe that the Bitcoin community is less than 15% of its total size

Or is Bitcoin not going to be big? Are the people buying Bitcoin for the first time today not considered early adopters, in which case when do you think we passed the 15% total? 

So the first set of numbers is derived by estimating the total size of the players in the Bitcoin community.
  the 2-3000 is derived from an estimate of the block chain analysis and on Silk Road triad analisis (they can be firmed up if someone has a good source.)

With regards to technical performance problems, I believe necessity is the mother of invention and they will be solved as this grows. 

But with regards to adoption and value there is a problem of supply and demand.
When something is in limited supply the price will increase, and likewise as the price increases the demand will drop. So demand for Bitcoin will decrease as the value transfers to the early adopters. 
My concern is that the equilibrium between supply and demand for Bitcoin's will have no relationship to the Bitcoin Economy, the result may very well be a ponzi.

I have no background in this knowledge, but aren't you reading too much in these numbers?  On what are you basing these statements, isn't there a lot of variability between different technologies? (just curious to know)



What problem are you refering to?  Blockchain size and synchronisation speed?

The true valuation of bitcoin will be when it isn't exchanged to any other currency at all.

Exchanges are a phase, not an end. Same with Dollar/Euro/Pound/Yen/Yuan valuations and comparisons. We're only doing it this way now because we're "bootstrapping". Later, these currencies will seem quaint and outmoded.

Sure it matters the benefit Bitcoin has over existing systems is security, P2P and Finite quantity. Therein lies the potential value as a means of exchange.  The potential is dependent on the size of the economy.  The economy size is dependent on the number of willing participants.  So the real value only increases with the number of economically active participants.  (the ponzi value is not considered real value unless the economy develops )

I am all for the early investors benefiting immensely (personally I think each Bitcoin I own could have the purchasing power of $300,000 someday in my lifetime)

I am not looking at the Technology adoption lifecycle as causal but rather a correlation in an attempt to predict adoption.  If there are going to be 1,000 players in the Bitcoin community the first 150 are the early adopters who benefit by receiving huge wealth, if there are going to be a 100,000 players in the Bitcoin community first 15,000 are the early adopters. But examining statistics it looks like there are about 2-3000 active members in the Bitcoin Economy, and looking at the wealth distribution it looks like mega wealth is concentrated in less than 100 members. I would expect 80% of the wealth to be distributed among 4-500 members if we were in the early adopter's stage. But as about 2/3 of Bitcoin's are distributed in a small minority, I believe we are in the later stages of distribution, and would consider that some new comers to the Bitcoin party are early majority participants.

My counter argument is the problem in today's economy is wealth distribution, and if Bitcoin is to grow to over 100,000 participants, the amount of wealth that will go to just a small minority, will in fact be more problematic that the problem of wealth distribution today.   

The Hype cycle clearly refers to start-ups and the investor confidence related to investment opportunities for entrepreneurs or venture capitalists and no drought relevant to particular ventures that depend on Bitcoin and its adoption. None the less it is unrelated to the adoption of new technology by the public or customers, still very interesting, thanks for posting.

@ hahahafr, The Technology adoption lifecycle "please check out the link" refers to the adoption of new technology, the meme that is Money, was one such technology like the wheel or modern agriculture, it went through the same adoption process until the new technology became irrelevant or ubiquities. The people who didn't adopt the new technologies were either forced to adopt, or contributed to evolution by not propagating.

Bitcoin is one such meme, my interest is more where the Bitcoin community sees saturation i.e. when do we think we will start to see saturation?   While I am heavily invested and love to hear people tell me this is going to be big, I have seen a problem in the system design in relation to propagation and adoption, and am trying to understand how I can help propagate the technology, so I can cash out on my investment or help catalyze in a new age of sustainable prosperity.

Escrows, m-of-n, and time-lock transactions. There are many technical projects being developed as well. Don't even get me started on the tools in development. There is a big blue horizon ahead for Bitcoin, but so far we are only starting to taxi.

care to explain what are these?

As far as I'm concerned; until complex transactions are available, Bitcoin adoption is in the puppy love stage.

This Hype cycle is exactly what it sounds like.  Products are hyped beyond their immediate usefulness. They crash. The good ones find traction and steadily increase.  The momentum and duration of the post-hype cycle growth depends on the technology.

Our marketcap is 130 million.  We haven't seen anything yet. Trust me.

Your image is wrong OP. This is the true cycle of any new technology.

Edit: We are between stage 4 and 3.

I think you are seriously overestimating the effect of the amount of coins already in existence. Bitcoins growth ability or level of development has little to do with that.
Sure late adopters will transfer wealth to early adopters, so what?  That is not going to stop anybody.  As long as they see it as a means to transfer funds more cheaply, have currency that isn't inflated away etc., why not buy it?  I mean, if bitcoin gets adopted, then it will rise in price, and knowing typical human psychology, people will want to buy even more.  It could easily become one of the biggest bubbles ever.  I still think we are a long long way from there.

How far could bitcoin appreciation go?  Well,  I think in the most rosy situation, in which bitcoin survives all hurdles (no security failure, no government outlawing it, no better alternative, scalability goes great ... etc.), and should all governments accept bitcoin as legal tender as well (so it is the only type of money left), bitcoin could go to roughly 600k worth of todays USDs purchasing power....  
No, I am not crazy, yes it is an extremely optimistic scenario (you were asking how far this could go).  The calculation is quite easy: just take world global currency reserves (12.5 trillion $) and divide that by 21 million BTC.  Money velocity is low right now, so when this normalises it should reduce purchasing power of money, but on the other hand, I did not even take into account the monetary value that BTCs could take from gold (which would drive it up to a million $/BTC , assuming golds price would be entirely derived from monetary value).  


By the way, to answer your initial question, I think we are still early adopters.  Whether bitcoin will survive it to another stage is another question entirely...

EDIT: I mistyped the value earlier on.

Time for an update.
In consideration of my opening post I would like your perspective in the light of the thoughts below:
Half the coins ever to be mind are now out there, that leaves just less than 50% of all coins to be distributed among the entire Bitcoin economy. (I think it is right to think of Bitcoin as an economy rather than a network, it is a decentralised economy - as Amazon has the best real estate in the new Digital world, so too is Bitcoin staking out new real estate in this borderless digital world)

Where in the life cycle is Bitcoin if Half the coins are out there , and all newcomers have to pay the equivalent of a later comer tax, or the early adopters charge an early adopters premium (think supply and demand the have's charge whatever the have not's are willing to pay)

How much more can this grow?

Wow, very interesting...

the e-book tag as To-Read    after "The First Civilization" - A free book about a Resource Based Economy. Submitted by Jas Garcha = A must read !

Deff early adopter stage. Until cards are available to easily spend the currency and it is FAR easier to buy/trade it will remain a very niche product.

Keep us updated on this.   

I guess we better acquire and hang on to as much as we can before it becomes popular. If it does not succeed...we just lose some money we were gonna lose already apparently.

Yeah, of the 20 or so people I've mentioned it to, two had heard about it before. One of whom was a high-level guy at a major Wall St. firm in the 80s/90s, and the other guy is a tech-entrepreneur. Their level of knowledge about it was medium, I guess. They both understood the idea; that it's not just another internet currency, but neither had really thought about it or researched it much.

It seems that usually people who follow tech or finance closely seem to know about it, if at all. And even then not always so much.

Since it's usually the scam du jour they're hearing about, little of this perception is positive.

Bitcoin is currently still in a very early stage.

I only found out of it by accident and haven't heard from it since, unless actively searching for it.

Also, not a single person I mentioned it to has ever heard from it.

As I see it very interesting time are before us as it seems like bitcoin has reached its market cap of geeks and people exited about new concepts. I would count people who are joining now as the first of the early adopters.

We are probably just existing the Innovation stage and entering the early adopters stage. Time will get exciting as ether bitcoin will climb the step to the next level or will remain at it's current level and slowly loose importance.

All my personal opinion of course. And at least I hope that this is the stage we are currently at, because with the current scamming everywhere, if we would already be in a adoption stage, I would see black for the future of BTC.

I wonder what percentage of Americans have even heard of Bitcoin. I mean, if you polled 100 people at random and asked them "what is Bitcoin?" -how many of those people would at least know enough to identify it as "some kind of Internet currency"? And the real question, what percentage actually understand it, i.e. recognize that no, it's not the equivalent of WoW gold - that it changes everything?  Based on my conversations with friends and family, I'd put those numbers at 2 and 0.2, respectively, but I'm probably being too generous. 

I think as people get into the movement that no bank controls bitcoin, whatever happens - will happen.

e.g If bitcoin becomes to popular that the mining difficulty increases, then the developers of bitcoin will im sure - modify to acomodate.

Email is a good example as well. Hell when I first heard about email I thought I would never really have to use it. Now I couldn't imagine what my life would be without it. We aren't even at the stage where everyone is hearing about it and asking about it yet. To be honest I have only mentioned it to a few close relatives and friends and it seems like nobody ever takes it serious like I do so I just don't even talk about to anyone unless it's on this forum. I feel like it is inevitable that it will become popular is some form or fashion and I'm just going to be ready when it happens. Like a few of you already stated, when people who shouldn't know shit about bitcoin start mentioning it in conversation...look out here she comes!

now that we have asic its has evolved

I agree with Timm here. The same can be said for alternative medicine. On the west coast people didn't know what acupuncture was in 1997. By about 2003 people were starting to seek treatment. Now it is old hat, but consumption is still growing rapidly.

I have a friend of mine that isn't particularly technical. This person tends to acquire a gadget or adopt something way after the majority has. I'll know precisely where we are when I hear this person ask me about this 'bitcoin' thing. I think we all know people like this, and it is really the only way to verify true penetration into the middle of the curve.

Of course, I've never discussed bitcoin with this person because it would be a long conversation for them to 'get' it. When they are finally curious, that is the moment we've "arrived".

Saying 1.5 billion users are necessary to reach a "tipping" point is just silly.  PayPal has 100 million users.  If Bitcoin had more users than PayPal it likely erase the very need for PayPal and virtually every other person to person payment platform on the planet.

PayPal has a large enough network effect that if it weren't for the downsides (centralized control, seziure of funds, inability for everyone to get an account due to AML/KYC requirements, etc) the number of accounts would likely BE in the billions.

Where is the tipping point?  Hell I don't know for sure but I would say on the magnitude of tens of millions not billions of active users.

I'm not sure where Bitcoin is in the lifecycle, but I will say that it isn't anywhere near mass market appeal. That's fine though, because there a multi-billion dollar niche markets like gambling and international remittances.

Beware reifying models, particular simplistic pop-sci ones

thanks

15% of the global population is not needed to reach "the tipping point".