Quote:
Originally Posted by DeathAndTaxes
Why? Why would transactions need to be in whole numbers. Bitcoins can be transfers in transactions as small as 0.00000001 BTC.
Actually, they are all in whole numbers, we just use a decimal point to make things easier to read.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DeathAndTaxes
Most traditional transactions are not "cash like". You can sell me something, I pay by paypal and then tell paypal I never received it. This source of friendly fraud increases business cost and legit customers end up paying for it in higher prices. Bitcoin is irreversible. If you give me 20BTC then that transaction can never be reversed (similar to cash). Obviously that means it has all the risks AND dangers of cash.
While the banking network is robust it is also centrally controlled. Americans learned the govt via control of the banks made it very difficult to transfer money to poker sites. If poker sites accepted bitcoins those transactions couldn't be prevented. Hell if PS for example ONLY accepted bitcoins it is unlikely the govt case would be much more difficult (maybe impossible).
You can add those layers on top. It doesn't exist now. PayPal is great for buyers. It's a disaster for sellers. You basically are SOL when you get scammed, they seize your funds, and you are screwed.
There was a service where you could escrow money, they take a small cut, and then release funds when items are received. If Bitcoin were to take off, you would see a lot of similar things to what we see now. Banks, e-wallets, etc... You'd see buyer protection services. Right now it's just a bunch of amateur-hour sites out there, but if it became significant, it would likely pop up. But the fees would likely be a lot smaller.
Irreversible transactions where you can't track who the person on other end is means you should be extremely careful with your coins and extremely careful with your wallet. Getting ripped off is easy. But you would be the same way with cash- if it's someone you trust or you can't get ripped off, use cash. If you want protection, you'd use a credit card or escrow.
If it takes off, it will be in black/grey markets initially. It's not easier to use than cash/PayPal for people who don't have any coins. So it needs some bootstrapping to get there. Where it will make sense is where people get huge benefits from using it. Right now that seems to be black/grey markets and also remittance or huge fee transfers of funds. This may be enough to give it stability and to increase the economy to add features that mainstream users might want to have (e-wallets, protection, escrow, etc...), and then it might make the leap. Or it might not.