Comments on: Everything You Want to Know About Bitcoin, the Digital Currency Worth More Than the Dollar

By: 31337

31337 — Tue, 15 May 2012 19:19:33 +0000

Truth is the large bankers/Bilderberg types don’t like it when somebody else muscles in on their business and they don’t have any control over it and don’t know how to reach the person/group who actually does control it. Meaning the greedy bastards don’t like the competition and want to control it. Its the same reason why they are doing their best to regulate the internet and succeeding in a lot of countries.

By: leah

leah — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 02:45:20 +0000

It’s like forex exchange not like a bank

By: chicken coop

chicken coop — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 17:11:23 +0000

I loved this quote from the article: “The first thing to consider is that currency is just the physical manifestation of a promise.” I wonder how many people realize just how worthless a physical dollar or coin really is these days. Interesting article. Thank you.

By: bitcoin

bitcoin — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 15:22:50 +0000

kool post keep em coming. game on brother. peace

By: Veronique Greenwood

Veronique Greenwood — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 13:17:44 +0000

@Avanti, Mark, fixed–many thanks.

By: Aleksandar Kuktin

Aleksandar Kuktin — Sat, 11 Jun 2011 16:01:42 +0000

The true value of bitcoins is not in the currency itself, it is in the digital technology that makes it possible. And it’s key point is that it can be decoupled from the bitcoin and used for ANY other currency.

Say you have 10 bitcoins on you account and you want to hold them in you hand (so you can by regular socks at the store). We could set up money-changing businesses (for example, but it would probably have to start with government institutions). Then you digitally send your coins to such a business, drive to the business, show you ID and pick up 10 shiny new bitcoin bills. :) Then you exchange them for regular socks and the shopowner drives them back to the money-changer who converts the bills back to digital currency and digitally send them to the shop-owners account.

Infact, why use bitcoins? We can do the EXACT SAME THING with US dollars! Or any other currency.

It would cut the banks and payment processors out of the loop, which is a huge win in my book.

By: jostmey

jostmey — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:32:55 +0000

To fully appreciate the size and growth of the bitcoin economy, one has to see all the items that may be purchased with the currency. A couple sites now show an aggregation of merchandise and services from various services. It is clear that one can buy almost anything with bitcoins.

For example, check out searchbitcoin.com or bitcoinbulletin.com

By: Mark Oates

Mark Oates — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 20:25:53 +0000

the article said “more than 6 million Bitcoins have been issued”

Correction, for more accuracy:

more than 6 million Bitcoins have been authenticated.

By: duh

duh — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 19:27:58 +0000

Did anyone ever consider that the person who created Bitcoin did so with a scheme in mind to either make fake bitcoin or he created millions of bitcoin himself before the value went up and got the network to agree on them. Then when the value (only 21 million is very small considering that is like that 0.0035 bit coin per person on the planet (yes I know not everyone is on the net and will use bitcoin, just saying as an example) goes up this joe smoe who invented it dumps several million bitcoin into firearms and is now rich (after he sells the firearms for real money).

By: Avanti Shrikumar

Avanti Shrikumar — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 18:40:22 +0000

Woah, that explanation of public-key cryptography sounded profoundly messed-up. Both your private and public key are used for every communication you make; your public key allows people to decrypt messages you send, and you private key ensures that only you can send the messages you send. Alternatively, your public key allows people to send you messages, and your private key ensures only you will be able to read them. Nowhere will you use JUST the public key or the private key. The wiki link itself has: “When someone wants to send a secure message to the creator of those keys, the sender encrypts it…using the intended recipient’s public key; to decrypt the message, the recipient uses the private key” and elsewhere “the private key is used to sign a message; anyone can check the signature using the public key. Validity depends on security of the private key.”

By: Bob Maloney

Bob Maloney — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 17:20:46 +0000

bitcoin is not “totally anonymous” as you use for your opening paragraph.

I recommend this source as a good start to learn more about bitcoin:

http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=7269.0

Thank You

By: Nesetalis

Nesetalis — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 17:14:36 +0000

It should be pointed out that bitcoins are neither truly anonymous, nor are they really possible to launder.

Every time a bitcoin is created, it is agreed upon by the entire community that it exist, and belongs to an address.
then every time some of it is spent, there is a trail left, that ANYONE can see. This trail will stretch from the very first bitcoin all the way up to some one buying alpaca socks some time tomorrow.

People keep reiterating that its anonymous, but it isnt. It /is/ hard to trace, but certainly possible. Especially so if you know who atleast one of the addresses in the chain belongs to.