bitcoin currency supply can be expanded easily. currently a bitcoin is devisible into 100, so you actually have 21million x 100 as your currency supply. To expand the currently everyone on the network changes their settings to agree to split a bitcoin into more than 100 parts, say 10000 and the supply expands again
technically bitcoin is divisible to -->8<--- decimal places. So the end game is 21millionish * 10^8.... which in order of 2.1x10^15 2,100,000,000,000,000 digits of currency while to go yet
As far as bitcoin goes, the early miners could generate coins much easier in comparison to the new miners. Basically, it was the equivalent of walking onto land with gold ready to pick-up from the grass. The new miners walk in and all the easy gold has already been taken, so they start digging deep. In short: They need to put more _effort_ in for the same result. I'd think that with standard currency (at least from stories I've heard from old-timers), when a new one is introduced, people swap assets/old currency for it. The value of all assets are priced by the government in the new currency to allow for easy phasing. Whether you're late to the party or not, you can swap the value of your assets to the currency. It was not "cheaper" for those that go to swap early.
No one is denying the fact that earlier adopters get more coins for less effort, but surely you can see this as an incentive to engage early? Now is still early. Currently there are ~6 million bitcoins discovered out of a total of 21 million, if you start mining today (assuming growth of compute at a constant rate) you will be better off than someone that starts tomorrow. Sure you aren't as well off as people who mined before you, but is that really that relevant? I like to draw a parallel to the property market (something people see value in and exchange fiat for.. although many people wouldn't agree on here I am sure). The property market is finite, ie. the government can't just print land when they want to decrease the value of your land (they can release more land for sale, but there is a limit). Now I want to live on a block of land close to the CBD, but I can't because there is no way in hell I can afford it. Even if myself and my partner earned an above average salary for our lifetimes the likely hood of owning that land in my lifetime is close to nil. In contrast, the person sitting on the land bought it 50+ years ago (before I was born), and they purchased it on a mediocre single salary. How is that fair? they got in earlier than I possibly could have (I wasn't even born!) and now if I want to buy land two people have to work for it just to pay off a block half the size (land close to the city is becoming more sort after so block sizes are decreasing) and that is further from the city. Because of this inequity, does it mean I shouldn't engage in purchasing land/property? I could decide against engaging by renting (using a different currency method), or I could purchase land with the belief in mind that land is finite, and although I may not be as close as the block near the CBD, I still believe the block I am going to buy has value.. and will increase in value over time as more people want to buy land. I also know that the next guy to buy land after me will be even further out with an even smaller block of land and will likely be complaining the same way I am. It also comes back to risk. Early adopters can be seen as taking more risk because they are spending resources on a product that is not proven in any way and more likely to fail. As more people start to use the product (Bitcoin Currency in this case) the more likely it is that you will be able to exchange your BTC for good/products so you are taking less and less risk the later you join in. Even if you did get involved now with 3 CUDA enabled cards, you would have trouble to make a blip on the radar due to the massive influx of new hardware. It's definitely not a 'turn on PC, make money' venture now, you need to seriously invest in hardware/energy to generate coins, I still believe you're better off offering a service/product to get in at a lower initial investment.
The incentive is there as you say. If the plan is to make money, then people could still get in, because the run to 21mil is still on. Indeed, the inequality of real estate due to being late in the game is plain for all to see. It will be the same for bitcoin (and already is to some degree). If bitcoin would market itself as such then fine, no inconsistencies there. Maybe a banner like "Join while you can and be in a better position later" would suit it perfectly... So is it a money maker? Sure thing. But is it a currency replacement?.... No way. It is the very thinking expressed in your post that makes it inadequate as a currency. :| Currency should not primarily be perceived as a product or volatile asset in a bull market to invest in. It should primarily be recognised as a medium of exchange and have no financial value incentive to adopt early (and no risk not to).
Black markets dealing in drugs, guns, bullion etc already exist dealing exclusively in bitcoins. Theres definately a high demand out there for untraceable currency.
In the past other e-currencies have also been used by black markets. They have come and gone. The demand is there - no doubt at all - and I do believe we need something new, but I don't see Bitcoin as the future.
Chris from TheWeeklyTelegram says his piece: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3HqaxioLGE[/youtube]
Stopped listening at 4 minutes in, guy has lack of understanding of the technology. Accusing it of being a scam is a fundamentally wrong, it may not be a valid technology but it's not a scam. Also he is annoyingly north american. I certainly am not saying that bitcoin is _the_ answer or that anyone should invest into bitcoins or bitcoin mining. BUT It's just as valid as fiat currency and from what I can see solves several of the problems with fiat I'm sure all of you can imagine the awesomeness of not having to worry about rampant inflation caused by currency manipulation or having to use paypal ever again if you don't want to. Also special mention, thanks radiobirdman for your insightful and well thought out contribution to the topic, I'm sure my brain will implode if I try to read anymore of your wisdom, please refrain from posting in this thread any more, possibly in the whole forum as you may cause others injury too.
heh heh, he doesn't sound trustworthy if you know what I mean I'm all for cutting PayPal out of trades. FX is also a big rip-off, especially when done through banks. We can agree on that. But as for inflation... Even if Bitcoin could be a currency, it would only protect against inflation caused by money supply, and only to a certain degree. By will, the money supply could be increased to massive numbers by changing the decimal places to 8. Helicopter Ben would need to change his name to Aurora Ben if he had the reigns, but of course, the lack of central control is on Bitcoins side on this one. Other than that, other forms of inflation can still occur. If the general price level changes (e.g. food, clothing, water, electricity), then you will be able to buy less than previously with the same amount of bitcoins. However, that applies to all currencies. Of course, I still cannot see Bitcoin as a currency due to the main reason we've discussed.
http://www.dailytech.com/Digital+Black+Friday+First+Bitcoin+Depression+Hits/article21877.htm Epic crash of 30%, good stuff BitCoin.
Another mega-uber-great-super-cool fiat idea of "money"? Good luck, bitcoin, i'll stick to my gold and silver. AHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHA I mean seriously. (...)" It costs you nothing"(...) Well THATS THE FUTURE LADS! Im laughing so hard, I mean seriously ....
Its still up over the week though. It doesnt cost you nothing. It takes an incredible amount of cpu/gpu time to generate bitcoins. I can generate about 1/day running a top of the line graphics card for 24hrs. Thats a lot of money just in electricity.
Not entirely bitcoin but I found this comment on slashdot hilarious Source: http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2230966&cid=36410962
I love the amount of people getting involved calling it crash, Bitcoin is doomed! All the same people are quoting a single source as the source of truth, mtgox. As I have said in my earlier posts, centralised services go against the decentralised nature of Bitcoin. No one has even said mtgox is the single point of truth for Bitcoin trading rates, but because it always shows up as the highest value on bitcoincharts.com everyone (the blogosphere) decides to use it as such. Bitcoin is worth what people are willing to pay/trade for it. If you're going to believe mtgox blindly then of course you are going to run into problems. I know several people who trade in Bitcoins and ignore mtgox completely. How can you even trust mtgox trades of that price and volume are actually occuring? not only can you, why would you? I hadn't spoken to anyone who thought that the stratospheric climb on mtgox was sustainable or even worth getting involved in, but as soon as it declined all the armchair experts decided those who used Bitcoin were idiots because 'they fell for it' even though the majority weren't in anyway involved in the mtgox spike. As was mentioned in the Slashdot comments, plenty of other trading sites were essentially unaffected by this, mtgox just happened to be getting everyones attention. If you trust mtgox as your single point of truth for the value of Bitcoins you're likely the type to invest in paper gold and paper silver. -edit- I realise now my posts on here are coming off as Bitcoin evangelist, which isn't what I am aiming at, I just believe that if you're going to comment on something invest some time in researching it first (so I am partially trying to play Devil's advocate). A lot the Bitcoin arguments (and conjecture) are tired and seem to be revived once a week through blog posts. Some of them are relevant and worth discussing/exploring which is good to get involved in. Those who stack silver and gold will likely have dealt with same issue in a different way ...it's a lot like trying to explain why you invest in silver to people who keep their money in fiat so they can earn interest from their bank account... at what point do you just stop trying to explain yourself? If you hate it, hate it.. that's your choice.
