ashray

If you want to cash out to USD or Euros I run a service http://bitcoinsaresexy.com - you can cash out to amazon gift cards or even paypal money and then buy whatever you like ;)

Edit: really ? downvotes on this ? why ?

The problem with your premise is that you are taking up bitcoin and trying to fit it into today's world view where banks lend out YOUR money for relatively high interest and give you some interest if you're lucky. Now, you have to keep your money in a bank because it appears to be safe, etc. and of course all your arguments about creating liquidity in the economy are correct.

However, there is a lack of choice in this scenario. Due to the way the economy functions, I do have to put my money into a bank, I do have to look into investments because otherwise my hard earned money is worth less in the future. Let's leave the discussion about that being fair or unfair, etc. because this is a subject where people tend to have strong opinions.

Right, so coming to bitcoin. Why can't there be an entity that allows you to lend your bitcoin as a loan and you get a higher return (higher % interest than regular deflation) because you lent your money out (i.e. took some risk) ? Say deflation is 5% per year and you can give out a loan through some entity and get 10% returns ?

Isn't this what the bank does right now for you ? But do you have much of a choice in the current scenario ? Right now, you take on the risk of a bank without having a say in it. It's either that, or have your purchasing power slowly eroded over time.

I personally don't like arguing about inflation vs. deflation because I am not an economist but I can on my own think of trivial solutions that turn the problem around. Maybe these solutions are ultra complex to implement in practice, but so are the economy, currency markets, stock markets, etc.

Can I argue that it would be great if I worked hard to earn money and save it, and have it at the very least, retain it's value and purchasing power in the future? Why should the capital that I have worked hard to earn lose it's value because it somehow doesn't help the economy ? Helping the economy comes with it's own risks. Why do I not have a say in whether I have that choice or not ? What happens if my bank goes bankrupt ?

Most exchanges will ask you to buy at least $1 worth of bitcoins so that pushes your figure to about 0.001 BTC as a minimum purchase. However, you can certainly use them with up to 8 decimal places.

This is a valid question. One that I think about often.

It's not easy to predict the valuation. For that, we would need to know how much business is done in bitcoin in the future. That's anyone's guess. Will it do $1 trillion or will it do more ?

The price isn't always going to rise at this rate. That's for certain. However, yes, there will probably be a long term rise until bitcoin finds it true usage, market cap, and as a result of this, it's value with steady deflation going forward.

While, I'm not sure what an economist's opinion on this is, the fact that you are encouraged to spend money because it's worth less in the future (inflationary fiat money) leaves a really bad taste in my mouth. Consumerism is a horrible disease and our planet is suffering from it every. single. day.

That brings me to bitcoin and it's deflationary nature. Well, you're still going to buy the stuff you want to buy. Then, you'll save more because you know it'll be worth more later. Why wouldn't you buy the things you always need ? (food, shelter, a few gadgets, etc.) Should I spend on a new iPad when I might be able to buy 6 months worth of food with that money a year or two later ?

You'll save as much as you can. You'll consume less junk. Isn't that a good thing ? Shouldn't we ask ourselves if we really need all the crap we keep buying ?

These are interesting questions that challenge the entire nature of mindless consumerism that most of us indulge in these days.

Also, if the only reason you spend your money is because it's going to be worth less tomorrow then you have bigger problems than bitcoin ;)

PS - I don't mean you personally, just stating some thoughts.

I don't really consider bitcoin to be the absolute solution. But it's certainly flexible enough to be a great solution.

With increasing transaction volumes the bitcoin network is lately having some issues confirming transactions with low or no fees. Furthermore, with the appreciation of bitcoin/usd value the minimum transaction fee (hardcoded at 0.0001 BTC) is getting too high. (Rising from 0.05 to 0.08 cents)

The thing is, bitcoin is still very much a WIP project, a beta if you will. It still needs more bright people working on it to improve it.

This was just because of that single $147MM transaction yesterday. Of course it's great because this shows bitcoin can sustain a small number of high volume transactions.

Unfortunately one of the biggest challenges the bitcoin network is facing right now is getting smaller transactions confirmed faster. This issue will need to get solved and get solved sooner rather than later if bitcoin wants to be a competitor to VISA or MasterCard.

Maybe more HNers should take a look at the core: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin

There should be, if they chose to withdraw their bitcoins from Gox. But assuming that the article is right, there would be another transaction that moves the money from their private wallet to bitstamp/another exchange as well.

Basically all there is evidence of right now is that the Chinese are buying tons of bitcoins. No evidence of selling/moving as such.

It's not possible to use Gox for USD withdrawals at the moment so I don't think they'll try that anyway.

If the Chinese regulators are so smart and capital controls are so tight, then how would the Chinese get money out via bitcoin ?

What about the entire paper trail:

a) from bank deposits/tenpay deposits to BTC China where they convert to bitcoins

b) and then allegedly sell on a foreign exchange (bitstamp, maybe ?)

c) following which they withdraw to an overseas bank account ?

If we're talking about illegal money (not part of the banking system) then again BTC China isn't reportedly accepting any cash. So how would that work ?

The evidence isn't really that clear. What we see is the Chinese buying a lot of bitcoins.

There's no evidence that they then moved those bitcoins to a foreign exchange, cashed them out, and then moved that cash to an overseas bank account. Do you have anything at all that supports this ? Not even the bitcoin network transaction volume is in agreement with this kind of movement of coins.

That's actually an interesting point. It's possible that people on BTC China are not in fact moving their bitcoins out of the exchange and selling them on another exchange to launder money. They're possibly holding bitcoins in their BTC China wallets. Those transactions will not influence the over all bitcoin transaction volume.

Furthermore, per exchange volumes have been insanely high over the past few days. See: http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/

What you basically pointed out points towards the premise of the article being false. It's not money laundering, it's something else.

Markets tend to price in future usage. Are there indications that bitcoins will be extremely valuable in the future ? Yes.

Is there progress being made every day with bitcoins ? Yes.

Is there global potential for bitcoin to be used as some form of currency ? Yes. (it is already being used in small amounts in several places)

Markets tend to price these things in. Investor sentiment is optimistic. Bitcoins current position certainly doesn't justify this price. But the market has priced in the future.

This. I've been trying to explain to people on r/bitcoin and r/bitcoinmarkets that I'm pretty sure that the Chinese have well polished ways and means of getting money out of China, in spite of capital controls.

When the mafia figures out bitcoin is a good way to do this things will start looking quite different.

What do you mean doesn't leave the system ? If I were to exchange yuan for USD at a currency exchange/bank, they would keep the yuan and give me USD. The yuan wouldn't get destroyed and lose value or leave the system. It would be either a) handed back to another guy who wants to buy yuans for USD or b) used for the profit/operations of the currency exchange.

BTC may for the time being move currencies without any perceptible loss in exchange value but the exchange value of BTC will go up per yuan with greater demand. The yuan will devalue against BTC but maybe this isn't a big problem because BTC isn't a major world currency .. yet ?

Yes, but what about point of sale purchases? It's worth it for merchants to let you pay for beer or food using bitcoin.

MtGox withdrawal issues are huge. I wouldn't downplay their issues at all. Speaking from personal experience I had a $10,000 June/July withdrawal stuck for 8 weeks. Customer service wouldn't give any timeline.

After a lot of back and forth they said I could pay a 5% fee and get my USD in 7 days. Basically a bribe for them to convert to JPY and send the transfer through..

At the time, they said withdrawals would take 2 weeks.. Now if they say 6 weeks you should pray :p

I ended up buying back some BTC (at about 10% loss due to price) and then selling later on bitstamp due to the recent price rise. Worked out okay for me but please DO NOT USE GOX FOR USD.

Chinese demand is currently driving global demand. They seem to love it.

I've made about $15k buying low and selling high but the current run has pushed me into hold mode. I don't know when this is going to top out but it's fun to watch.

It's not at all hard to buy and sell now as opposed to back in 2012. There are tons of options. Of course where the price will go is anyone's guess..

Edit: I should add that I did my transactions on bitstamp. Used to use MtGox earlier but it's not worth it, too many issues with them.

Case in point: I hold quite a few bitcoins. I am waiting to sell them. The deciding moment will be when my mom mentions bitcoins to me the first time. That will be the trigger ;)

Applied! Hoping to see what you guys think and even if I don't get selected some detailed feedback would be great!

This touches a personal chord. My dad recently died of IPF and while its not in the same category as cancer I'd say its a terrible journey to have a disease that literally takes your breath away, and not in a good way.

I personally understood how support systems fail, how folks would rather always hear that you are getting better but with IPF - you only get worse. IPF is as common in the US as breast cancer, the difference being that it is 100% fatal in 2-5 years on average. (Lung transplants can improve longevity but eventually fail)

This person's story is deeply meaningful and told in a profoundly beautiful way. I wish I could tell my dad's story with IPF in a similar way. I'm trying to spread awareness with a blog on IPF and by donating to the pulmonary fibrosis foundation, just wondering about what else I could do. Awareness is super important!

IPF - Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis - http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiopathic_pulmonary_fibrosis

Well, due process used in this context normally means innocent until proven guilty. Unfortunately the approach taken in this instance is the reverse 'guilty until proven innocent' or worse 'guilty and that's it'.

Yes, property seizures, arrests, etc. can happen as part of due process however there are complicated legalities associated with those things. For example, you actually need a court order to make an arrest (an arrest warrant) or a warrant to seize property. Getting a court involved means you have to prove something as well, or have enough evidence. Furthermore, other things such as danger to safety, security, flight risk, etc. are all considered by the judge.

I guess that's where due process is being totally skipped here. There is no court order, no warrant, just a threatening letter without any formal basis.

Due process went out of the window a long time ago when the US showed everyone that it is certainly possible and even admissible to seize domains without any sort of process. The US (department of homeland security, no less!) started seizing domains about 2 years ago. They went and basically took down any domain that was related to large scale piracy (demonoid) or counterfeit goods (sites that sold fake gucci bags, that kind of stuff..). The other kind of site that they targeted were mostly sports streaming sites (ones that streamed ESPN, etc.).

It was obvious that the UK would follow soon enough seeing that such a thing was entirely possible. Of course when the US seized a spanish website (rojadirecta) domain, they were challenged in court and lost. [0] There were also several other incorrect seizures where the US government ended up seizing sites that had nothing to do with any illegal activity and then returning them a year later [1]. This is what happens when you ignore due process.

Most small service providers and ISPs feel threatened when a big government like the US comes after them. Unless they have properly defined protocols for dealing with this kind of stuff, the support rep will probably buckle under pressure and hand over the data.

Personally, I've seen instances where domain registrars are often requested for private registration data without court orders or any sort of legal basis. Some registrars hand out the data. Some registrars email their customers asking them to transfer away (so stop being our customers) to continue protecting their privacy. Some registrars actually have the guts to say no. It really varies.

We're certainly at a point now where governments can easily coerce internet businesses to bend to their will. There will be a brave few who will stand tall but I don't know how long it will be before their backs/businesses are broken and bent (lavabit being a recent example).

Of course the UK government probably doesn't have access to the root name servers and therefore is left with sending out notices. But there's no telling when governments (who are of course sponsored by corporations as we all know by now..) will start cooperating with each other for such take down requests. Sort of like the reverse surveillance agreements with Germany/Australia/etc. (can't spy on my own citizens ? no worries, you spy on mine, I'll spy on yours, and we'll exchange notes!)

And I thought the dark days of the internet were in the 90s...

[0] - https://torrentfreak.com/u-s-returns-seized-domains-to-strea...

[1] - http://torrentfreak.com/feds-return-seized-domain-111208/

Sad to see this site go. Looked like a great project. So just out of pure curiosity, where would someone go to legally acquire lyrics for a particular song ? (sorry to say this but this sounds absolutely retarded to me.. what exactly are you damaging by publishing lyrics to songs ? I don't see the copyright argument at all.. it's not like someone will not buy a song because they can access the lyrics for free online ?)

It's unlikely that the US will ever really default in the near future. Why ? Well, the global economy is becoming more and more linked as time passes. A US default will trigger a collapse in the larger global financial markets. Do US creditors want this ? Nope. They'll just keep extending deadlines but of course this charade can only last for a certain amount of time. Personally, I think the collapse will not come from a US default but due to this bubble over extending itself and eventually popping in a Lehman'esque style.

An example of this is how last year India (a developing country, although with a rather large GDP) donated money to the European Union in the form of an economic stimulus, basically to prevent a default. The reason was simple, an unstable european market hurts growth prospects worldwide. There's a saying in India "When Wall Street sneezes the Indian markets catch a cold". An increasingly linked global economy puts economic stability at #1 on everyone's agenda. Of course, this is great for the US because they can wage wars, etc. etc. while taking on unlimited debt and no one wants to lift a finger (militarily, they can't - economically, they can't either because of the repercussions). Of course the bubble will pop at some point. We don't know when, though.

Do you have any citation to support your claim that Switzerland is not a high cost country ?

A simple google search shows Switzerland as one of the most expensive countries in the world. Usually following Norway or Denmark. So why am I factually incorrect?

I searched for 'worlds most expensive countries'. Maybe I did something wrong ?

Of course I know everyone doesn't live in Zurich but the average cost of living is still relatively high outside of Zurich/Geneva. Also, I mentioned in my initial post that this is a good deal so we are in agreement for the most part.

First of all, I didn't down vote you. Secondly, all I suggested was that the OP take cost of living into account for his calculations. This is hardly senseless considering that cost of living in most Swiss cities is higher than most tier 2 American cities.

Swiss cities often rank at the top for most expensive cities in the world so yeah, I'd say cost of living is certainly on the high side. Of course they also rank at the top for quality of life but that's another side of the same coin.

Lastly, my numbers may not be current or correct (last I went to Switzerland was July '13) but your tone is certainly rude and out of line. Sorry I didn't represent Swiss prices correctly, thanks for the correction.

Just bear in mind for your calculations that in Switzerland a cup of coffee often costs $6 as does a can of coke. Cost of living is extremely high. But still, this does look like a decent deal. Zurich is like San Francisco in terms of expenses.

Hey no worries. Thanks for pointing it out, I just (wrongly) assumed that since the show was over everyone around the world had watched it. But definitely go ahead and get to it because it's incredible :D

The parallels between the show and what just happened with this Ross guy are pretty mind blowing.. ($80MM is a key point, then the fact about him turning from a 'nice justice oriented dude' to a total bad guy)

His money is in bitcoins. Not sure if they'll be able to seize it but that would be an interesting situation in itself.

He was apparently really careful about connecting to the server. The docs state that he logged in through a VPN provider and he logged into the VPN provider at an internet cafe (which was apparently close to his house).

However, the document doesn't seem to state who the VPN provider was or if he was the customer tied to the VPN account (probably avoids this info because the VPN is account is in someone else's name). So again, can't prove via this route that it was him.

I'm curious to know how they managed to find the Silk Road server though..

I went through the evidence portion of this (page 24 onwards) and found that inspite of a pretty deep look into everything there isn't much to tie this guy to the Silk Road operation. There are a few things that could tie them together:

- The fact that the SSH KEY on the server was for frosty@frosty.com which was the same thing he changed his Stackoverflow profile to..

- The fact that he asked on stackoverflow how to curl over tor

- The fact that he apparently tried to promote Silk Road on two forums

This stuff certainly points towards him being the guy, but is this evidence enough ?

<BreakingBadSPOILER>And I'm asking this 'cause Jessie's video confession to Hank wasn't enough to get Walt... </BreakingBadSPOILER>

What the document tantalizingly avoids is how they managed to find out where the Silk Road servers are. It mysteriously states that there are several Silk Road servers around the world and the FBI gained access and got an image of the server through cooperation with one of the hosts. How did they get to the servers behind the Tor network ? This is a very interesting technical question and honestly, I'm impressed.

Following the whole Kim Dotcom debacle I'd like to see how this seriously loaded ($90MM) guy progresses through the justice system.