Bitcoins

BoracicLint

This is a good article from ibtimes, regarding value in the tech as opposed to the coin itself:

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/523848/20131120/bitcoin-value-technology-axel-merk-interview-opinion.htm

Lets not forget, we also live in a time where Twitter was valued at $70 Billion after its IPO despite posting significant losses last quarter, likewise with the Snapchat founder being offered $2 Billion by Facebook despite it never having produced a cent of revenue. There are many ways to judge the value in something that go far beyond what you see on the surface.

paddyrg

BoracicLint wrote: »

Lets not forget, we also live in a time where Twitter was valued at $70 Billion after its IPO despite posting significant losses last quarter, likewise with the Snapchat founder being offered $2 Billion by Facebook despite it never having produced a cent of revenue. There are many ways to judge the value in something that go far beyond what you see on the surface.

Yep... by ignoring history in these cases. Do you remember Marconi? Just one of the many companies that went from cash positive to bust for speculating in dotcomboomandbust1.0.

BoracicLint

paddyrg wrote: »

Yep... by ignoring history in these cases. Do you remember Marconi? Just one of the many companies that went from cash positive to bust for speculating in dotcomboomandbust1.0.

Yes of course, but it was Marconi's aggressive telecoms asset purchasing and lack of diversification that saw it fall from grace. I don't see the correlation with the valuation of Bitcoin. I'm by no means suggesting that anyone invest any serious capital into Bitcoin, but there is some serious value in the technology if you investigate it's potential.

DominicJ_2

So what is stopping Bitcoin being accepted as a store of value, in the same way gold is? It's only really Gold's wide acceptance, scarcity and tradition that give it value.

Even Gold has industrial uses, or luxury uses
I cant wear a bit coin, nor can I plate speaker cable with it.
BitCoins value comes only from "bigger idiot" theory

But feel free to disagree.

BoracicLint

DominicJ wrote: »

Even Gold has industrial uses, or luxury uses
I cant wear a bit coin, nor can I plate speaker cable with it.
BitCoins value comes only from "bigger idiot" theory

But feel free to disagree.

I'm not disagreeing that gold has value, but the value you put on an ounce of gold (i.e what you pay for it) is not reflective of its use, gold jewellery has a huge premium on the price, relative to the amount of gold it is composed of.

What if you want to trade your physical gold for goods and services? You need to divide it up, transport it, store it securely etc.. As a currency, Bitcoin has more 'value' than gold, however purely as a commodity, gold wins.

padington

What's the best exchange to use, can kraken.com be trusted ?

csm888

DominicJ wrote: »

BitCoins value comes only from "bigger idiot" theory
But feel free to disagree.

OK, i'll bite
The idiot is the one who doesn't research properly.
The reason digital currencies didn't properly exist before Bitcoin is because no one had solved the double spend problem. The Bitcoin protocol is a significant technological development and solves this through 'proof of work' or the mining process.
Bitcoin's value comes from the fact that it was the first to implement these technological inventions.
Unless you believe ideas and inventions have no value, you are clearly wrong, there is value in the idea of Bitcoin, and that is what most of the techy nerds like me appreciate and get excited about, the fact that we have also been lucky enough to make some £ through speculation has only heightened our interest, but it is not the only factor.

Marazan

csm888 wrote: »

OK, i'll bite
The idiot is the one who doesn't research properly.
The reason digital currencies didn't properly exist before Bitcoin is because no one had solved the double spend problem. The Bitcoin protocol is a significant technological development and solves this through 'proof of work' or the mining process.
Bitcoin's value comes from the fact that it was the first to implement these technological inventions.
Unless you believe ideas and inventions have no value, you are clearly wrong, there is value in the idea of Bitcoin, and that is what most of the techy nerds like me appreciate and get excited about, the fact that we have also been lucky enough to make some £ through speculation has only heightened our interest, but it is not the only factor.

Bitcoin's solution to the double spend is pretty awful as solutions go, reliant on huge (for a digital world) lengths of time to confirm the transaction and a voting mechanism that is incredibly vulnerable if any state level actor wanted to make a go of attacking it.

DominicJ_2

CSM
"Bigger Idiot" theory
It doesnt matter what I pay, I can always sell for more to a bigger idiot.
Works fine, until you cant find a bigger idiot, and you hold a $900 list of 0's and 1's.

Grain has a value, because someone can eat it
Sterling has a value, because you can pay taxes with it
Bitcoin has a value because? Its rare? So's my fecal matter. $900 a pound?
Its digital? So is this text, worth $900?

A lot of people are going to get rich off Bit Coins, and then a lot of people are going to be stuck with a worthless scrap of code, with no value except what they can convince a sap to pay for it.

dryhat

DominicJ wrote: »

CSM
"Bigger Idiot" theory
It doesnt matter what I pay, I can always sell for more to a bigger idiot.
Works fine, until you cant find a bigger idiot, and you hold a $900 list of 0's and 1's.

Grain has a value, because someone can eat it
Sterling has a value, because you can pay taxes with it
Bitcoin has a value because? Its rare? So's my fecal matter. $900 a pound?
Its digital? So is this text, worth $900?

A lot of people are going to get rich off Bit Coins, and then a lot of people are going to be stuck with a worthless scrap of code, with no value except what they can convince a sap to pay for it.

Is the "bigger idiot theory" like the "bigger fool theory"?

Or are they two different things?