Those are all companies in an ocean of an industry; the internet.

Bitcoin and all the VC money that has flowed into it thus far will effectively ensure that no digital currency competitor will ever take a real foothold off of bitcoin.

The point is that you're not going to subvert thousands of companies with a supposed superior product because they have infrastructure and more importantly special interest. Bitcoin in it of itself is an industry now and not a singular entity that can be easily outmanuevered akin to myspace and Napster.

honestly this is a very safe position to take vis a vis tech conventional wisdom.

It has kinda always been that way even in 2011 people thought BTC was going nowhere, usually these people are uneducated on the topic and are just regurgitating what the majority is saying, look at Peter Schiff though he was a hater and now he's accepting BTC on his precious metals brokerage

In due time those people down talking Bitcoin will be using it whether they know it or not, people thinking Bitcoin will die anytime soon can put that notion to rest as long as the internet is alive so will Bitcoin

A lot of the technology people use simply becomes transparent to them, or is used without knowing that's what it is. Especially when dealing with complete gamechanging technologies. Desktop battle may very well become irrelevant.

That being said, the talk is mostly good and concerns I think I've shared in the past. Bitcoin needs to have uses that are far beneficial for adoption, or will be stuck in niches. Hearn discounts speculation by calling it "get rich quick", but really, adoption is adoption and once people are willing to accept it, it becomes a great way to settle debts from a long distance.

If Bitcoin follows Linux (not just the narrow vision of desktop), it's a huge success. Look at all the devices in your home that run Linux without you realizing it. I have set top boxes, Roku, a NAS, phones, tablets. Who knows what else is running it without me knowing it. The game changed, and desktops are less relevant, and the tablet/phones will show Linux the winner in the end.

Bitcoin is going to get to the masses first where people don't know they are using it. After that, it needs to become more usable and safe for masses. Those are some bigger goals. But even in a niche, it has a considerable amount to grow.

I've got the same feeling I had when I bought at 20. Sold at 180-200.

Got the feeling again at $130 after the crash to $50 and sold for $800.

Well folks, I've got the feeling again! Can't explain it, but I've picked it off before 2 monster runs in the past. Even when I'm not in it, I'm watching it and have a "feel" for it. Add in my magic equation and I think we're set to go.

Downside at this point I feel is minimal $500-550ish range. Growth will be slow and steady (for bitcoin anyway 10-20% month) to the upside unless huge news like Ebay or BTC etf or some other catalyst launches it. Watch and learn.. I put my money where my mouth is.

Most of the VC money can easily switch to another crypto if that became dominant. Some of the companies already support more than one crypto (usually LTC, DOGE). I'm not denying that bitcoin's first mover advantage is massive, just that if something happened to make another crypto take off in a big way, then those companies will switch to supporting both currencies pretty quickly.

Can anyone link me to a professional evaluation of bitcoin price report? I tried finding the one that Merrill Lynch put out in December but couldn't find a working download link. I don't know if there have been any since, but links to any would be great.

These both fail for me:

https://www.documentcloud.org/docume...n-bitcoin.html

https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.document...on-bitcoin.pdf

I tried googling "banks-research-report-on-bitcoin filetype: pdf" but couldn't find it. I did find a goldman sachs one here. http://www.paymentlawadvisor.com/fil...s-Bit-Coin.pdf

here you go https://www.dropbox.com/s/ydlp155t2t...on-bitcoin.pdf

JP Morgan's views: starts page 5

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...%20Mailbag.pdf

It would have to be something devastating.. None of the other Cryptos offer anything innovative or different compared to Bitcoin considering most of them are based off the open source code of BTC

I doubt a switch would happen most companies that support BTC are fairly purist and seem to want to only support BTC the important ones anyway, bitstamp and bitpay everyone's been begging them for LTC support with little result

I believe there is only one VC investing "directly" into bit coins, Ie: buying them.

The rest, like Valar pointed out - are really just investing in the infrastructure and networking and would easily be able to pivot to a new crypto currency in an instant.

It's really one of the big miscommunications to the general public that is going on at the moment. When they say Marc Andreeson has invested in bit coins, its not really that true. He's invested in the infrastructure that brings bitcoin to the masses (individuals and companies). If another became more popular that infrastructure could easily be used to pivot to another one.

Fwiw, I'm long bitcoins - only because there is no way for me to invest really in the infrastructure, which is really what all these VC's are doing.

I could be wrong, but dont most VC firms operate under different rules of the type of investments they can make.

I agree that the vast majority of the other crypto offer nothing different or better than bitcoin. Chief among the useless clones is LTC. But there are some that offer something better, IMO, and possibly in the future ones that are better still will come along.

Bitcoin has no serious challenger, and just because Bitpay doesn't take LTC, doesn't mean it wouldn't take a useful coin if one developed a serious market cap.

From a logistical standpoint of a business model, no VC money would easily switch to another crypto from bitcoin.

That's because professional VC guys like him would never invest in businesses that expressively operate within a gray area. Until the legal landscape clears (e.g. within the next 1-5 years) this is the type of professional VC you're going to see because no self respecting public VC guy would ever invest in something that even has a 1% shot at becoming illegal when we talk about the kind of money he's looking to infuse into companies. So of course he's investing in USD side bitcoin businesses.

great article, and something that underscores what I've been about a lot recently with regard to bitcoin.

when remove the american narrative-lens from which you analyze bitcoin and it becomes a totally different story.

I don't understand what you mean. Lot's of VC money in BitPay. Say in 6 months time there's a coin called Alt1 which has become as widely used as Bitcoin and has a similar market cap. If BitPay's customers want to provide the option of Alt1, do you not think that BitPay will incorporate the option of using both Alt1 and Bitcoin? At the end of the day, why would BitPay care whether Alt1 or Bitcoin is used? Their business model is the same either way.

no offense but this post is pretty bad

***BASELESS SPECULATION AHEAD***

IMO, BitPay may be doing something genius. Their business model basically keeps the price of Bitcoin low by making it easier to cash Bitcoins out (all why being seemingly "Pro-Bitcoin" by having people spend to "promote Bitcoin", which is like ****ing to promote virginity). BitPay, in the process, skims a portion of the Bitcoins. Their business is not terribly expensive to operate and scales extremely well. Their biggest play may very well be just a way to acquire Bitcoins at a low price now, all while building the ecosystem and drive value up. If you believe in Bitcoins and think they will succeed, what better way to do it than by getting in ahead of the curve, keeping the price lower than it otherwise would, help prevent any crazy rushes, and skimming off as much as you can? Then when the price does start to rise considerably, you profit far more than you would have just in your business.

this reminds me of what Vinny Lingham said about bitcoin and where he sees the price in the near future.

He essentially said that it was far better for businesses and the development of bitcoin as an industry as a whole for the price to be stable and "lower" near term than if it were to be worth thousands soon.

I'm not sure you quite comprehend the magnitude of what you're proposing.


First, people have to lose confidence in Bitcoin. There are still only thousands of merchants in the world that accept Bitcoin. In 6 months you want them to just convert to Alt1?

Something nefarious has to happen to Bitcoin in order for that to happen.

https://blockchain.info/pools?timespan=24hrs

what does this mean? these guys are reaching 51% and i keep hearing about 51% attacks or something. is this a good time to dump?

They are keeping themselves below 50% just so that nobody starts to worry about something they have no intention of doing.

They could do some nasty **** but there is no incentive. It is a serious issue though but not a reason to sell bitcoin now. I wish people would use p2p pools to avoid this centralization.

I am still fairly new to the bitcoin scene.

1. I am not from US and I decided to purchase bitcoins from other services and have them sent it to my coinbase wallet. Is that advisable? Or should I create a US bank(Considering it is possible for a foreigner that is not staying in the US)?

2.In terms of security, is having just a coinbase wallet good enough? Or do I have to encrypt it and backup? If so, is it possible to do it with coinbase or do I need some software?

Thanks!