Yeah, but Bitcoin crashed lower than gold, so... ...and after the Mt.Gox scandal... ...how much more trust can you have?
Bitcoin is going down, just like gold. Perhaps it would be worth buying some, once it hits "rock bottom". Again, it's a matter of trust. If people lose trust, the price will sink. The mere fact that they're not buying constantly to push up the price will make it fall down after a while. Yes, technically it's interesting. I still don't own any. Can't see the point at this moment. It's too expensive and there's really nothing to do with it. Not now, at least. If it sinks down, one could buy in and perhaps one day, Bitcoin will be wide-spread.
That's the problem with bitcoin, investors, or rather, speculators. I am sure it would act perfectly well as a method of online, untraceable, purchasing, as it was intended to be used. I think there is certainly a place for a non government currency that the politicians and banks can't manipulate and inflate and tax and screw up like they are doing with their own currencies. But that isn't good enough for some people, it isn't enough that it can be used to buy things without people sticking their noses into your business, it has to be an investment vehicle. And as soon as it becomes and investment vehicle it stops acting as a currency. Who is going to buy a pizza with bit coins if tomorrow they could buy two pizzas? Who is going to save enough bitcoins to buy a house if tomorrow they won't be able to afford a shed? So you are left with an investment vehicle, with no other use, it's not like silver, at least when the price goes to zero you still have a decent coin collection. When bitcoin drops to zero you can't even buy anything with it, and as its only real use is to buy things, then it has no use at all. At least you won't have a shed full of bitcoins that you have to pay someone to take away.
Every time coins are seized they are auctioned off, this causes minimal movement in the market because a buyers snatch it up easily. If you look at the news of when numerous online black markets were taken down bitcoin price barely faltered. Since then bitcoin has hit $380USD on a strong rally. Compare this to SR1.0 when it dropped heaps on the news and quickly recovered. The illegal uses of bitcoin has very little impact on the market.
I can certainly imagine sentiment changing and people abandoning Bitcoin for something else at some future point in time. Such things happen, especially if people were to become disillusioned or untrusting of Bitcoin. Remember when MySpace was the greatest thing on the Internet and had more visitors than Google at one point? Where is MySpace now? All it takes is for a critical level of people to decide to move on to the next big thing and the crowd will follow.
i dont think you can compare myspace to bitcoin. bitcoin currently is only an experiment, theres no doubt it is a true paradigm shift in transmitting value electronically, including the public block chain ledger. maybe once some new an improved altcoin is launched then people will switch however this article is simply attacking bitcoin without any valid reasoning. https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/debunked-professor-attacks-bitcoin/
I was more referring to the vagaries of sentiment and the impact it can have on things that once were thought unassailable. MySpace was one of the early social networking sites, and then people people moved on to something that become even bigger... FaceBook. The idea of social networking didn't go away with the demise of MySpace, it exploded in popularity beyond anyone's early conception. And it could be the same with Bitcoin which is pioneering, but may not last if people become disillusioned with it, especially if something much better comes along that gets taken up by a growing number of people. We could see a new cryptocurrency explode in popularity far beyond what Bitcoin is now.
