Topic: Why aren't I filthy rich yet? It's been like two months. - page 2. (Read 11635 times)

*bump*

Well, that's a little better, Bitcoin. Not good. But better. Now how about we quit playing games and get serious? I don't want to end up as one of those poor schmucks who still has to work when he's 35. 

Your calculation is a bit off there...
1 BTC = 1.01 bars of gold.

Back in the hype-days of 2011 a friend urged me to sell my coins (this was when we were just about passing $3, around easter or so). I said: "no, I'll hold them for a very long time and only sell if I really have to".  He said: "uhm, there must be some price at which even you will sell". I answered: "ok, true. I might sell some when the price hits one bar of gold".

I had in mind a 'bar of gold' as you'd see in a James Bond movie. A "Good Delivery" gold bar should be around 380 oz = 11.8 kg of gold.

Assuming 250,000 tons of gold exist aboveground and can be mined in the next 30 years that would amount to 250,000,000 kg / 12.5 kg/bar = 21,154,000 bars of gold.

Assuming gold and bitcoin turn out to be equal contenders, then:

21,000,000 BTC = 21,154,000 bars of gold

so

1 BTC = 0.99 bars of gold

So it seems I'll never sell my stash of bitcoins.

I don't know if it is an accident, but Bitcoin really is like gold.
Aesthetically anyone who has used it must have that sense - it has a certain weight to it.
Having used if or nearly a year it does actually feel tangible - perhaps if it was totally easy and you didn't have to wait 1 hour for your 6 confirmations it would somehow feel trivial and worthless.
Waiting for those confirmations actually gives it weight and value. It adds something to its worth.

I don't know if it is an accident, but Bitcoin really is like gold.
Aesthetically anyone who has used it must have that sense - it has a certain weight to it.
Having used if or nearly a year it does actually feel tangible - perhaps if it was totally easy and you didn't have to wait 1 hour for your 6 confirmations it would somehow feel trivial and worthless.
Waiting for those confirmations actually gives it weight and value. It adds something to its worth.

Don't forget all the hacks that are going on. It's impossible to make a bitcoin business 100% secure as long as hot wallets are needed. If you haven't been hacked yet, you were simple not yet a target - seems to hold some truth here.

I carry around a Casasius physical bitcoin and often get the opportunity to show it and use it as a prop to help describe what Bitcoin is.  I also carry a second Casascius bitcoin, opened revealing the private key (previously spent), which is useful to understand how bitcoin is just data that can be used with a mobile or online.

I also have in my wallet in my back pocket a few strips of paper ... each a paper bitcoin wallet from BitAddress:
 - http://www.bitaddress.org
I have funded these with 0.1 BTC and have given them out in the same spirit as the Bitcoin faucet.  I do keep a copy of the private key and let the recipient know to redeem the code in 30 days (e.g., using "redeem" QR scanner on Mt. Gox Mobile app for Android) otherwise I recycle the funds to a new paper wallet address.

Additionally, what helps bitcoin move forward to is actually use Bitcoin today like we expect it will be used in the future.  For instance:

Purchase wireless prepaid refills using Bitcoins (there are now or will be soon three sources for this):
 - http://www.bitmit.net/en/user/TangibleCrypto  (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Cricket, etc.) (to be branded as CellCoin.net )
 
 - http://www.btcbuy.info/CallingCards.cshtml

And coming soon:
 - http://www.bitcoinwireless.com  (from BitInstant)


Or pay for all NewEgg, Amazon, eBay, Barnes & Noble, etc. purchases using bitcoins:
 - https://www.spendbitcoins.com/convert
 - http://www.btcbuy.info/Default.cshtml


Offer to broker the trade of bitcoins for others (friends, family, neighbors, etc.).  If you already have a Dwolla and Mt. Gox account, for example, keep an amount of USDs at bay so that if someone wants bitcoins, you are prepared to help them (which, of course, expands the community and helps us all).  But make sure to impress upon them the need to get set up on their own for the next time.     Same thing goes for someone wanting to cash out -- you can leave an open offer to buy bitcoins.    There is a line though between doing this infrequently and not-for-profit versus someone acting as a money service business in which they might have restrictions (in many jurisdictions).

Learn the bitcoin economy, and what bitcoins can buy.  We all know about Alpaca socks.  But do you know about Bitcoin Deals, which has a catalog of more than a 100,000 products, from travel luggage to toilet tissue:
 - http://www.BitcoinDeals.com

Or did you know that in more than a half dozen cities bus/rail fare transit passes can be reloaded using bitcoins?
 - http://bitfare.org

The Trade page on the Bitcoin wiki continually sees new additions:
 - http://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade

Are there any "assets" at a bitcoin stock market which are interesting to you perhaps?  They aren't all mining endeavors.  Feed Ze Birds and ZipConf, for instance, are two issues whose success brings further commerce to bitcoin:
 - http://www.GLBSE.com

And Bitcoin doesn't have to be all business.  Do you have a buddy insisting your team isn't going to win?  There's an app for that:
 - http://www.BTCSportsbet.com
Or is there interest in the election?  Right now there is a bet with skewed odds on the chances who will win the presidential election:
 - http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=122
Or any number of topics:
 - http://www.BetsOfBitco.in

What it boils down to is, those holding bitcoins shouldn't just sit on them.  A position can be maintained at a steady level by spending bitcoins on goods and services and then replenishing the position to accommodate for that spending.  These actions help bitcoin businesses make it through this crucial period where the market might naturally not yet be large enough for the business to be viable.  But with each additional bitcoin used in commerce, these businesses can start to justify their existence.  Because the revenue stream for these endeavors is in bitcoins, they then use the proceeds and profits for spending and that spurs further economic activity.  Your spending has a multiplier effect in the bitcoin economy.

And a much wider bitcoin economy is what is needed to justify over the long term the exchange rate at a level anywhere near where it has risen to ($55 million "market cap", currently).

The problem is that Bitcoin, as a concept, requires a greater than average understanding of:

- Economics
- Networks
- Coding
- Cryptography
- Social science
- Market forces
- ... and I'm probably missing a few.

That is the reason most people don't get it. Most people have a somewhat basic understanding of one, two or maybe three of these, but not all.

Think about what needed to be understood for the concept of email to take hold. Not now, with the ability to open a gmail account and send an email within seconds, but back when NO ONE had a computer sitting on their desk. There was computing (how to get a computer to work, how to give it DOS commands, how to set up a modem through the phone line, how to get an email across those lines, etc)... people used to prefer to pick up the phone, or send a letter through the mail. And now they don't. It isn't that their understanding of these items has magically grown, it's just that those who did understand them well made them user friendly to the point that the average Joe doesn't need to figure it out, much like he doesn't need to understand electrons in order to throw a light switch.

That's happening with Bitcoin too. Take a look at Bitinstant, Bit-Pay and a host of others... it's coming, my friend. "Real's gonna change" :-)

Again: lots of btc businesses were created last year, and reported profits. This year is the first year governments will be taxing them, and thereby legitimizing btc.

This makes sense. Inevitably, this year will see the legal status clarified, as these will be first tax filings after btc became valuable.