Topic: Would you buy a 0.1 BTC Casascius Physical Bitcoin as a giveaway? - page 2. (Read 6619 times)

They do make waterproof adhesive lables that can be run through an inkjet(i do need to get that up in my thread) if waterprofing is desireable. Did you give the coins a test in your laser yet?

I believe an intact hologram will keep water off the paper for quite a long time.

Interesting, didn't know you used inkjet on paper.  Does that mean the coins aren't waterproof, or does the hologram hold a seal good enough to assure that the paper doesn't get wet?

On the upside, it means that the hologram couldn't easily be floated off the coin without leaving a trace - you'd also ruin the private key on the paper!

I still think cheap coins (0.10 or 0.25) with a simple protection (gold scratch-off) would be best.

Hmmm.  Would some type of metallic hologram help with that?  How about printing the privkey on the coin somehow instead of engraving it?

I would cover them with a hologram, but they would be too easy to read with any kind of ray that is reflected by the metal.  The engraving would change the shape of the metal and would be detectable.  So the hologram would be poor assurance that the key has not been read.

Compare to my regular coins - I am using inkjet on paper - which I think would be much more difficult to read from the outside.

I think the private key should be covered by a hologram or a scratch-off label or something, and they should have no expiry.

I clicked "Depends on price", but I wouldn't want a lot of them. the hologram seal really is the cool feature of these coins, making them valuable.

I'm really waiting for the new series of 1 BTC coins. I wanted to buy a lot of the old ones at 1.20+shipping, but the price was raised and I ended up waiting for the new series. Even if Bitcoin should rise by quite a bit again, they're valuable enough to be cool but cheap enough to give away every now and then (though not at 1.80 a piece, that's too much for me).

So if the choice is to either do a cheap one or focus on the new 1 BTC series, please focus on the new 1 BTC series! That's what people are waiting for. And that's what I would use to get people into Bitcoin, given that they are reasonably priced.

I disagree with them expiring.  It might introduce someone to Bitcoins if they find a discarded coin years down the road, and think, "hey, I wonder what this is?", then find out that they now own 0.1 BTC.

Just to be clear; I dont really oppose the idea of 0.1 BTC coins (though I think the 'full option' 1BTC coins make more sense, but choice is good), I just oppose the idea of making those coins expire , particularly if they expire long before they've had any chance to appreciate in value enough to make redeeming more than just an exercise in futility.

+1

What about a 0.01 BTC dabloon to be thrown out at Martis Gras parade? People collect them like crazy.

What's the cheapest we could get a token for?

I wouldnt be amused finding out the coin expired years ago, as suggested in the post I replied to

Yes, exactly this.

The point of them is, it's a cheap conversation piece.  Even if they were worth 5 BTC each, some people would never bother to redeem them.  But the fact that it has SOME value, regardless of the AMOUNT of value, piques people's interest.  Those people will be interested whether it's only 0.1 BTC or whether it is 5 BTC.

And people who want to give away 1 BTC coins can just buy the "real deal" casascius coins and give those away.  There's no reason those coins couldn't be used in the same manner.

I think it's perfectly okay for people to toss them right now. It would be a 20 cents conversation starter. It would do a lot to help promote Bitcoin IMO. And if they do toss them, so what? It's just 0.1 btc lost forever. But imagine the day when 0.1btc is worth something and people started finding them in couches. That would be funny.

There is already such a project that does more or less that. BUt honestly, how many people are going to redeem 0.1 BTC?
And then what, they have 0.1 BTC in their wallet, only took them a day to download the blockchain and/or 20 minutes to setup a mt gox account,  12 attempts to get the numbers right. What can they do with it? Nothing. I just dont see it.

0.1 BTC might have some purpose if you speculate on long term appreciation. It might one day become worth enough to bother, but making them expire in x weeks, you might as well save yourself the trouble.

Found the wiki page. Thanks. Sweepprivkey looks like a very useful piece of functionality, much more so than importprivkey, since it would also allow the user to redeem their private keys (without importing them).

Just a thought, as a promotional tool I think of the handing out at large gatherings scenario like occupy movements.  Being that the private key is not hidden, they could be coins or they could be printed on cards.  I think some people will really get it, some will kinda get it and some won't get it at all and throw them away.  This being the case I think it might be a good idea to print/mint up a version that has an expiration date and if the btc hasn't been spent by that date the btc will be redeemed by the issuer.  If this is printed on the coin or card it is understood and not dubious considering this is for promotional use anyway.  The card could also have more information on it.  Thoughts?

AFAIK, thats not how it works there. As on most websites you dont have a balance, you trade directly with the buyers/sellers.
I also cant imagine ordering some munchies or alpaca socks or even space cake and typing in codes of one coin after the other.
4x 1BTC coins and 12 BTC cents lol, we are going to need that small change after all

Anyway, the logical way is importing them in the official client. That would be awesome. Mt Gox is not a solution IMO, not for 1 BTC coins at least. No one if going to sell 1 BTC on MT Gox. I would also like to think these coins have more enduring value than possibly Mt Gox, so some generic way, no matter how complicated for now, would be nice. Just so people see it can be done, even if Casascius and Mt Gox are no longer there, that their bitcoin value doesnt depend on it.

Also, as I requested before, some generic information would be very useful. Id really like to point my recipients to one single page that explains how the coin works, how to redeem it, what bitcoin, where they can spend them etc. Now I have to tell them, go here to redeem the value, there to see what a bitcoin is, oh and over there to find out how the Casascius coin works. A single (brief) page with all that key information would be great. Just put yourself in the shoes of someone who received such a coin and has no idea what it is. Christmas dinners dont last long enough to explain all that :p.

The Javascript redeemer sweepprivkey on a host is a great idea as long as it doesn't require setting up an account. It should be done anonymously, even if a fee is taken.

I have proposed sweepprivkey on the Wiki, which I believe will become the fundamental underpinning for redeeming Casascius coins and any other kinds of physical bitcoins.

With that function properly implemented, redeeming Casascius coins can be as easy as using a Javascript redeemer that initiates a sweepprivkey on a hosted service.  And fortunately, I have seen posts from Gavin suggesting he understands that sweepprivkey is an important function, possibly more so than importprivkey (this was in a discussion about importprivkey).  That right there will probably be the biggest ticket to widespread redeemability.

Ultimately, a customer should be able to redeem the private key on the website he wants to spend them.  God forbid, if he wants to use his physical bitcoin on Silk Road, he should be able to type his private key straight into Silk Road and have it deposited into his balance (assuming that's how they work there).  Sweepprivkey would enable that for any and all websites that accept bitcoin deposits.