[M3Bahn]

Anyone use this digital currency?

It just tanked in value yesterday.

http://bitcoinwatch.com/


Bitcoin—a pseudonymous cryptographic currency designed by an enigmatic, freedom-loving hacker, and currently used by the geek underground to buy and sell everything from servers to cellphone jammers. No, this isn't a cyberpunk artifact from Snow Crash or Neuromancer; it's a real currency currently valued several times higher than the US dollar, the British pound, and the Euro.

Bitcoin is a virtual currency, designed to allow people to buy and sell without centralized control by banks or governments, and it allows for pseudonymous transactions which aren't tied to a real identity. In keeping with the hacker ethos, Bitcoin has no need to trust any central authority; every aspect of the currency is confirmed and secured through the use of strong cryptography.

Over the last few months, Bitcoin's value has risen by an order of magnitude as the sagas of Wikileaks and Anonymous (among others) have highlighted the limits of a financial system which relies on centralized intermediaries. With a current estimated market capitalization of about $100 million, Bitcoin has recently graduated from a theoretical techno-anarchic project patronized by libertarians and hackers to a full-fledged currency prompting comment from technologists and economists. At the time of this writing, one Bitcoin (BTC) is worth about US$15.


http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...r-currency.ars

[JoosyJoos]

That's incredibly interesting and news to me.

Seems like a dumb idea though--- how do they regulate it? Theoretically someone could just make as many as they wanted.

[M3Bahn]

You can't add the coins at to the system at will.

The number of new coins generated per block gradually decreases over time. It started out at 50 BTC, but will dwindle to zero sometime in future when all 21 million coins have been generated. Fortunately, coins can be divided down to the eighth decimal place, which may prove increasingly useful if their value grows.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...r-currency.ars

People can obtain Bitcoins in two ways -- buying them or generating them.

To generate them, you have to run a complex math hashing algorithm, which tries to find a new bitcoin "block". Parallel computing devices -- namely GPUs have shown themselves most capable for this task. In fact with modern AMD GPUs it is possible to "break even" on your hardware costs by generating Bitcoins.

http://www.dailytech.com/Digital+Bla...ticle21877.htm

[xtac]

I'm glad I cashed in my 10k btc's in time

[Comet]

who accepts it as a currency??

I doubt I can pay my phone bill using BitCoin

[.:bHd:.]

people use this to order drugs online. untraceable so no one gets busted.. yet

[BTM]

Originally Posted by M3Bahn

A

Bitcoin is a virtual currency, designed to allow people to buy and sell without centralized control by banks or governments,

A virtual currency with nuances even more convoluted than real currency, how is this any better? The central control still exists in this case, it is controlled by programmers/code/hardware. TBH, I feel more comfortable with a government backed currency over a "hacker" backed one. Valued higher than the USD, Euro, are misleading. Technically, everything is currency (I'm being very general using the term currency, but then so is referring to bitcoin as a currency), in that it has value, and they can be used as a medium to complete transactions. My cellphone is valued higher than the USD, it takes more than 1USD to buy one. Too bad I can't pay for groceries with cellphones. THen again, I can't pay for groceries with bitcoins either. I don't see this catching on.

[M3Bahn]

Originally Posted by .:bHd:.

people use this to order drugs online. untraceable so no one gets busted.. yet

It can be traced in certain ways.

[Freakazoid]

Originally Posted by BTM

A virtual currency with nuances even more convoluted than real currency, how is this any better? The central control still exists in this case, it is controlled by programmers/code/hardware. TBH, I feel more comfortable with a government backed currency over a "hacker" backed one. Valued higher than the USD, Euro, are misleading. Technically, everything is currency (I'm being very general using the term currency, but then so is referring to bitcoin as a currency), in that it has value, and they can be used as a medium to complete transactions. My cellphone is valued higher than the USD, it takes more than 1USD to buy one. Too bad I can't pay for groceries with cellphones. THen again, I can't pay for groceries with bitcoins either. I don't see this catching on.

100% this, seems like they're just trying to appeal to the sky is falling mentality people