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I have no idea what he is talking about. I use bitcoin to buy things both onchain and via lightning and the experience is so smooth and much much better than t

I have no idea what he is talking about. I use bitcoin to buy things both onchain and via lightning and the experience is so smooth and much much better than the circa 2017 period when fees were high. Don't keep it on exchange. The real thing that is stopping adoption is countries trying to classify it as a commodity and insist to pay capital gains on every microtransaction. Some countries are backwards (US, UK) than the others. Germany and few other countries are forward looking. No VAT on bitcoin transactions and no CGT if held for a year.

Triv888 6y ago
They want the USD to stay king of currencies...
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  Yeah, that is explicit US policy, and implicitly supported by most other nations that have significant debts and reserves denominated in USD.
etimberg 6y ago
Why do you believe there should be no capital gains on it?
- risho 6y ago
  because you can't use it as a money if you need to pay capital gains on every stick of gum you buy. they should find other ways to collect taxes that doesn't inhibit it.
  - etimberg 6y ago
    If you held any other foreign currency you would have to track it like this. For example, I live in Canada and if I bought USD and then spent it over the course of a year in Canada I would be responsible for the capital gain tracked on each expenditure based on the day's exchange rate. It's hard to see how Bitcoin should be any different.
    - risho 6y ago
      because the goal would be to have bitcoin be an international money, not a national one. i'm not saying people shouldn't pay taxes, i would just suggest that there are better ways to collect it such that it doesn't inhibit progress. as it exists right now it is infeasible to use bitcoin as money day to day and accurately report your taxes.
    - wmf 6y ago
      There's an exemption for foreign currencies that does not apply to cryptocurrency.
- garmaine 6y ago
  Or subject to VAT...
- nichohel 6y ago
  Possibly funny thought: If you have to declare a capital gain on every BTC purchase of a cup of coffee, why can't you declare a capital loss every time you spend dollars that you earned long ago, and which have decreased significantly in value since then, due to inflation?
  - wmf 6y ago
    Serious answer: In the US, capital gains and losses are defined relative to the US dollar.
  - chii 6y ago
    you can and would declare capital losses on gold sold at a loss. Cash does not have gains/losses, as they are themselves the unit of accounting. The inflation effect causing cash to lose value is something you suck up - it's incentive to invest the cash.
    - ineedasername 6y ago
      US cash doesn't have gains/losses, but assets held in foreign currencies & converted to USD are subject to capital gains/losses.
  - ineedasername 6y ago
    Technically yes, the same rules apply as if you were trading in any international currency. If you sell yen at a profit to convert to USD & purchase something, you owe tax. What sort of tax can be complicated depending on how long the asset was held. I'm not an accountant, but I think assets held less than a year are taxed as personal income, so marginal rates apply. Assets held longer than a year are, I believe, taxed as regular capital gains. I'm not sure what would/should happen with extremely short term trades, i.e, you convert to Euros from USD for a vacation, the USD crashes, you convert back upon return from your vacation. I doubt the IRS worries too much about it, but I suppose technically you should file Form 8949 along with a Schedule D.
  - nichohel 6y ago
    The responses are valid as far as they go, but the larger point is that the government in a jurisdiction is free to inflate its own currency at great benefit to itself while simultaneously extracting taxes on fictitious "gains" of other currencies or equivalents (like BTC) against that currency.
raziel2701 6y ago
What kind of things do you buy with it and where? I remember seeing some adoption back when steam started accepting it, but sometime later they stopped because it was too volatile. I thought paying fees for the transaction made bitcoin very unappealing as well. It's not anonymous either, so I just couldn't find a reason to use it as it didn't solve anything that I couldn't do with my credit card. And my credit card offers me protections against fraud. Has anything changed that I should look into?
- baby 6y ago
  Last time I checked it was the only currency accepted by most dark markets.
- corty 6y ago
  > What kind of things do you buy with it and where? Drugs, CP, cryptotrojan ransom, other crime related transactions. Bitcoin value is directly related to relevant criminal activity.
  - s5300 6y ago
    Huh. Didn't know these were all the main exports of Nigeria
  - sunshinerag 6y ago
    Dollar is STILL the king of criminal activity, money laundering, kidnapping, ransom ... it will take awhile for the shift to happen.
    - corty 6y ago
      I didn't say all criminal activity is done via bitcoin. But there are segments of crime like cryptotrojans and CP trading that seem to be almost exclusively bitcoin-based. Others, like internet drug ordering, are at least partially in bitcoin. Edit: replaced "any" with "all" in the first sentence
      - 6y ago
xapata 6y ago
> No VAT on bitcoin transactions Sounds like a defect in the technology to me. A good currency should be able to support the full range of social policies (like VAT). One of the problems of the Euro is not being able to inflate different countries within the Eurozone at different rates. If Bitcoin were ever to become popular for regular transactions within many countries, it'd be a fiscal policy disaster. Pretty soon you'd hear Portugal, Italy, Spain, and Greece banning its use, along with similarly wobbly countries in other parts of the world. I remember Malaysia catching flak for halting foreign currency exchange during the Asian Financial Crisis, but it turned out to be a really smart move. It turns out that a globally integrated economy isn't always best for the smaller economies. They need to be able to adjust the spigot. Edit: I suppose this suggests a feature request for Bitcoin: namespacing, of a sort. If the currency were able to support cross-namespace conversion controls, like a tax determined by a function of the velocity and acceleration of exchange ... that'd be pretty darn cool. Each country could pick its namespace, and have control over its exchange tax function. Taking it further, you could tax intra-namespace transactions. VAT with no bureaucracy. Each account could be tied to a citizen, transactions taxed at some progressive schedule, and then uniformly distributed to every account daily. The transaction tax could be dynamic, to encourage currency flow in bad times, and to add some friction when things are overheating.
- sunshinerag 6y ago
  You are confused. There is nothing in Bitcoin that prevents VAT. It's just Germany's policy. Elsewhere they charge VAT on it like any other currency. I have paid VAT on all my bitcoin transactions like any other currency. I am not in Germany.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - xapata 6y ago
    That's good to hear. What about exchange controls? How do you see governments adjusting inflation with widespread international Bitcoin usage?
foepys 6y ago
The Lightning Network doesn't solve the congestion problem for global adoption. To open a lightning channel you need an on-chain transaction. The same is true to close one. Assuming 2,500 transactions per block, you will need ~970 days to just open a lightning channel for each US citizen (assuming 350 million citizens and no other Bitcoin transactions). Due to his limitation the Lightning Network is unsuited for any large scale use outside of exchanges.
- gruez 6y ago
  >Assuming 2,500 transactions per block, you will need ~970 days to just open a lightning channel for each US citizen (assuming 350 million citizens and no other Bitcoin transactions). >Due to his limitation the Lightning Network is unsuited for any large scale use outside of exchanges. But do we need to onboard everyone everyone in a year? It's like saying the internet will never scale because modem manufacturers can't keep up.
  - mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
    I'm mostly guessing at this because I'm not very familiar with Lightning Network, but I think they'd need to be closed out periodically as well in order to settle up? Plus, I think you'd ideally want an account with each vendor that you deal with, not just one account, otherwise I think the channel would probably need to be managed by some central authority who manages the accounting between you and whoever you're keeping these side accounts with, which seems not great for a number of reasons....and then on top of that there's that 350 million is just one country, let alone the entire planet.
    - gruez 6y ago
      >I'm mostly guessing at this because I'm not very familiar with Lightning Network, but I think they'd need to be closed out periodically as well in order to settle up? AFAIK they can be kept open indefinitely. >Plus, I think you'd ideally want an account with each vendor that you deal with, not just one account, otherwise I think the channel would probably need to be managed by some central authority who manages the accounting between you and whoever you're keeping these side accounts with The whole point of lightning is that you can use the network to route money between nodes, so you could make payments even if you don't have a channel open with the person you want to make payments with. It's not unlike how international wires work. If you bank with a local credit union in country A and you want to wire money to another local credit union in country B, the wire might bounce between multiple "correspondent banks" eg. credit union A -> big bank A -> big bank B -> credit union B.
PragmaticPulp 6y ago
> Don't keep it on exchange. The real thing that is stopping adoption... The capital gains tax issue isn't stopping your average person from wanting to use Bitcoin. If we're being honest, how many people would be voluntarily reporting taxes on their Bitcoin purchases anyway? I suspect it would be similar to how many people self-reported the sales tax they owed on out of state online purchases before it was automated: Near zero. The bottom line is that rational consumers like the features and services offered by traditional banks and credit cards. If someone steals your credit card and spends a ton of money, you just call up the credit card company and get your money back. If someone gets access to your Bitcoin wallet and takes all of your Bitcoin, that's it. Game over. Should have had better OPSEC, grandma. Likewise, people don't want to manage wallet passphrases and key files themselves. They want an exchange to handle the details for them, including as much risk as they can move to the exchange. The reality is that Bitcoin is still far and away an inferior experience to traditional payment methods. If I pay with Bitcoin, I have to deal with transaction fees and variable network delays and I have zero recourse if the vendor simply steals my money. With a credit card, the bank literally pays me 1-3% to use their credit card, payment is instant, and I can simply call the bank up and reverse charges if something goes wrong. I don't understand all of these mental gymnastics to explain away Bitcoin's shortcomings for payments.
- sunshinerag 6y ago
  >> The capital gains tax issue isn't stopping your average person from wanting to use Bitcoin How are you so sure? if I had to report and fill forms for every single transaction that I do, like say buying coffee or video games I would be put off with trying to use the currency. it is a way to cripple it's usage. >> The bottom line is that rational consumers like the features and services offered by traditional banks and credit cards. >> If someone steals your credit card and spends a ton of money, you just call up the credit card company and get your money back. >> If someone gets access to your Bitcoin wallet and takes all of your Bitcoin, that's it. Game over. Should have had better OPSEC, grandma. >> Likewise, people don't want to manage wallet passphrases and key files themselves. They want an exchange to handle the details for them, including as much risk as they can move to the exchange. >> The reality is that Bitcoin is still far and away an inferior experience to traditional payment methods. If I pay with Bitcoin, I have to deal with transaction fees and variable network delays and I have zero recourse if the vendor simply steals my money. With a credit card, the bank literally pays me 1-3% to use their credit card, payment is instant, and I can simply call the bank up and reverse charges if something goes wrong. I completely agree with these points. And I hope the ecosystem improves on these. Still the advantage of Bitcoin's fixed supply and it's ability to hold value vs fiat systems whilst it's capacity to also act as a currency is still something valuable. While it doesn't do everything the way horses (fiat) are now, it will get better as it is the car in the race.
ashtonkem 6y ago
> Don't keep it on exchange. This advice has always made me chuckle. It so profoundly misunderstands how non-techies actually think and operate, that I genuinely wonder how it arose. Exchanges exist and are incredibly popular because they're convenient. If you want to convince people to stop doing something that you think is bad, you need to provide a more convenient alternative, otherwise your advice will be ignored.
- BLKNSLVR 6y ago
  Or provide the myriad examples of why "Don't keep it on exchange" is good advice[0][1][2]. But it's not up to the advice-giver to do the due diligence. [0]:https://cryptosec.info/exchange-hacks/ https://cryptosec.info/exchange-hacks/ [1]:https://coiniq.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ https://coiniq.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ [2]:https://selfkey.org/list-of-cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ https://selfkey.org/list-of-cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    You’re kind of sidestepping my point. Yes, it’s a good idea to keep your coins off the exchange, for all the reasons you’ve provided. The issue is that keeping your money off exchange is far less convenient, which is exactly why most people keep their couns on exchanges despite the risks. If the Bitcoin community in general wants people to stop getting hacked on exchanges, they need to provide more convenient alternatives rather than just continuing to say “keep your coins off the exchange” and blaming users who get hacked for not following this advice. It’s a bit like recommending that everyone not drive to avoid dying in car crashes. This advice is strictly speaking true; the less you drive the less likely you are to die in a car crash. But it completely ignores why people drive and therefore most people won’t listen. As a society we’ve decided that rather than asking people to not drive, it makes more sense to focus on making driving safer per mile travelled. This is a much more effective strategy at reducing driver deaths.
    - ric2b 6y ago
      If some people like to leave their house unlocked because it's convenient it's not my duty to make them a more convenient door lock, it's quite enough to warn them about the dangers and let them make their own decisions. It's not like using a wallet is hard or inconvenient, it's just an extra step, like reaching for your keys before entering your house. But there can certainly be a business opportunity there, sure.
wpietri 6y ago
Could you give some use examples? As of 2018, Bitcoin still appeared to be basically useless as a day-to-day cash substitute: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/16/nyregion/new-york-today-living-on-bitcoin.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/16/nyregion/new-york-today-l... I guess it's not impossible that things have gotten better. But at least in my neighborhood and in the online merchants I frequent, Bitcoin adoption has declined. I think the last time I saw a Bitcoin logo on the street was August 2019. I'd also be interested in statistics demonstrating that the consumer transaction volume is now nontrivial. Last I looked, M-Pesa had orders of more magnitude in use despite launching around the same time as Bitcoin.
Someone 6y ago
That a German seller doesn’t charge VAT does not imply that you do not have to pay VAT. You may have to inform your tax office about the purchase, after which it will send you an invoice for VAT (happens for ‘normal’ bank transactions, too.) https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/taxation/vat/vat-rules-rates/index_en.htm https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/taxation/vat/vat-rules...: “For EU-based companies, VAT is chargeable on most sales and purchases of goods within the EU. In such cases, VAT is charged and due in the EU country where the goods are consumed by the final consumer. Likewise, VAT is charged on services at the time they are carried out in each EU country. VAT isn't charged on exports of goods to countries outside the EU. In these cases, VAT is charged and due in the country of import”
- masswerk 6y ago
  It's called "reverse charge". If there is a general tax agreement between your country and the EU, no VAT becomes due at the country of origin (of goods and/or services), but you are supposed to declare the purchase locally and pay local VAT, if applicable. There's also usually a marginal sum, below wich goods and services are free of charge (the sum of it, which includes any postage), about EUR 20. (Mind that this mechanism requires tax or VAT IDs on both sides of the transactions, which are to be declared.)
steeve 6y ago
Serious question: Bitcoin being subject to deflation, why would you spend it? Sort of like the $82 million pizzas [1] 1. https://qz.com/1285209/bitcoin-pizza-day-2018-eight-years-ago-someone-bought-two-pizzas-with-bitcoins-now-worth-82-million/ https://qz.com/1285209/bitcoin-pizza-day-2018-eight-years-ag...
- cyphertruck 6y ago
  Bitcoin is inflating, and will for 130 more years, though it is seeing increased adoption and is riding in price. But in answer to your question,I’m glad you picked food fir your example— would you starve to hold onto your bitcoin? Is your computer ten years old because next year better ones will come out? Or did you bite the bullet and upgrade because your time preference made it worthwhile? It is true, deflation encourages savings, but that is the essence of capitalism, savings keeps people better able to avoid poverty in the event of a bad year, and capital accumulation makes you more able to do a startup and retain control. Part of the reason there is so much VC money is inflation (VCs get new dollars cheap and carry trade through startups)with a hard currency like bitcoin the fotmula would be reversed, and founders would retain more ownership.
- Kiro 6y ago
  That's $300 million today, which illustrates your point further.
NicoJuicy 6y ago
> 2017 period when fees were high Current fees are 8$. That's still too high

Triv888 6y ago

They want the USD to stay king of currencies...

ashtonkem 6y ago
Yeah, that is explicit US policy, and implicitly supported by most other nations that have significant debts and reserves denominated in USD.

etimberg 6y ago

Why do you believe there should be no capital gains on it?

risho 6y ago
because you can't use it as a money if you need to pay capital gains on every stick of gum you buy. they should find other ways to collect taxes that doesn't inhibit it.
- etimberg 6y ago
  If you held any other foreign currency you would have to track it like this. For example, I live in Canada and if I bought USD and then spent it over the course of a year in Canada I would be responsible for the capital gain tracked on each expenditure based on the day's exchange rate. It's hard to see how Bitcoin should be any different.
  - risho 6y ago
    because the goal would be to have bitcoin be an international money, not a national one. i'm not saying people shouldn't pay taxes, i would just suggest that there are better ways to collect it such that it doesn't inhibit progress. as it exists right now it is infeasible to use bitcoin as money day to day and accurately report your taxes.
  - wmf 6y ago
    There's an exemption for foreign currencies that does not apply to cryptocurrency.
garmaine 6y ago
Or subject to VAT...
nichohel 6y ago
Possibly funny thought: If you have to declare a capital gain on every BTC purchase of a cup of coffee, why can't you declare a capital loss every time you spend dollars that you earned long ago, and which have decreased significantly in value since then, due to inflation?
- wmf 6y ago
  Serious answer: In the US, capital gains and losses are defined relative to the US dollar.
- chii 6y ago
  you can and would declare capital losses on gold sold at a loss. Cash does not have gains/losses, as they are themselves the unit of accounting. The inflation effect causing cash to lose value is something you suck up - it's incentive to invest the cash.
  - ineedasername 6y ago
    US cash doesn't have gains/losses, but assets held in foreign currencies & converted to USD are subject to capital gains/losses.
- ineedasername 6y ago
  Technically yes, the same rules apply as if you were trading in any international currency. If you sell yen at a profit to convert to USD & purchase something, you owe tax. What sort of tax can be complicated depending on how long the asset was held. I'm not an accountant, but I think assets held less than a year are taxed as personal income, so marginal rates apply. Assets held longer than a year are, I believe, taxed as regular capital gains. I'm not sure what would/should happen with extremely short term trades, i.e, you convert to Euros from USD for a vacation, the USD crashes, you convert back upon return from your vacation. I doubt the IRS worries too much about it, but I suppose technically you should file Form 8949 along with a Schedule D.
- nichohel 6y ago
  The responses are valid as far as they go, but the larger point is that the government in a jurisdiction is free to inflate its own currency at great benefit to itself while simultaneously extracting taxes on fictitious "gains" of other currencies or equivalents (like BTC) against that currency.

raziel2701 6y ago

What kind of things do you buy with it and where? I remember seeing some adoption back when steam started accepting it, but sometime later they stopped because it was too volatile. I thought paying fees for the transaction made bitcoin very unappealing as well. It's not anonymous either, so I just couldn't find a reason to use it as it didn't solve anything that I couldn't do with my credit card. And my credit card offers me protections against fraud. Has anything changed that I should look into?

baby 6y ago
Last time I checked it was the only currency accepted by most dark markets.
corty 6y ago
> What kind of things do you buy with it and where? Drugs, CP, cryptotrojan ransom, other crime related transactions. Bitcoin value is directly related to relevant criminal activity.
- s5300 6y ago
  Huh. Didn't know these were all the main exports of Nigeria
- sunshinerag 6y ago
  Dollar is STILL the king of criminal activity, money laundering, kidnapping, ransom ... it will take awhile for the shift to happen.
  - corty 6y ago
    I didn't say all criminal activity is done via bitcoin. But there are segments of crime like cryptotrojans and CP trading that seem to be almost exclusively bitcoin-based. Others, like internet drug ordering, are at least partially in bitcoin. Edit: replaced "any" with "all" in the first sentence
    - 6y ago

xapata 6y ago

> No VAT on bitcoin transactions Sounds like a defect in the technology to me. A good currency should be able to support the full range of social policies (like VAT). One of the problems of the Euro is not being able to inflate different countries within the Eurozone at different rates. If Bitcoin were ever to become popular for regular transactions within many countries, it'd be a fiscal policy disaster. Pretty soon you'd hear Portugal, Italy, Spain, and Greece banning its use, along with similarly wobbly countries in other parts of the world. I remember Malaysia catching flak for halting foreign currency exchange during the Asian Financial Crisis, but it turned out to be a really smart move. It turns out that a globally integrated economy isn't always best for the smaller economies. They need to be able to adjust the spigot. Edit: I suppose this suggests a feature request for Bitcoin: namespacing, of a sort. If the currency were able to support cross-namespace conversion controls, like a tax determined by a function of the velocity and acceleration of exchange ... that'd be pretty darn cool. Each country could pick its namespace, and have control over its exchange tax function. Taking it further, you could tax intra-namespace transactions. VAT with no bureaucracy. Each account could be tied to a citizen, transactions taxed at some progressive schedule, and then uniformly distributed to every account daily. The transaction tax could be dynamic, to encourage currency flow in bad times, and to add some friction when things are overheating.

sunshinerag 6y ago
You are confused. There is nothing in Bitcoin that prevents VAT. It's just Germany's policy. Elsewhere they charge VAT on it like any other currency. I have paid VAT on all my bitcoin transactions like any other currency. I am not in Germany.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- xapata 6y ago
  That's good to hear. What about exchange controls? How do you see governments adjusting inflation with widespread international Bitcoin usage?

foepys 6y ago

The Lightning Network doesn't solve the congestion problem for global adoption. To open a lightning channel you need an on-chain transaction. The same is true to close one. Assuming 2,500 transactions per block, you will need ~970 days to just open a lightning channel for each US citizen (assuming 350 million citizens and no other Bitcoin transactions). Due to his limitation the Lightning Network is unsuited for any large scale use outside of exchanges.

gruez 6y ago
>Assuming 2,500 transactions per block, you will need ~970 days to just open a lightning channel for each US citizen (assuming 350 million citizens and no other Bitcoin transactions). >Due to his limitation the Lightning Network is unsuited for any large scale use outside of exchanges. But do we need to onboard everyone everyone in a year? It's like saying the internet will never scale because modem manufacturers can't keep up.
- mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
  I'm mostly guessing at this because I'm not very familiar with Lightning Network, but I think they'd need to be closed out periodically as well in order to settle up? Plus, I think you'd ideally want an account with each vendor that you deal with, not just one account, otherwise I think the channel would probably need to be managed by some central authority who manages the accounting between you and whoever you're keeping these side accounts with, which seems not great for a number of reasons....and then on top of that there's that 350 million is just one country, let alone the entire planet.
  - gruez 6y ago
    >I'm mostly guessing at this because I'm not very familiar with Lightning Network, but I think they'd need to be closed out periodically as well in order to settle up? AFAIK they can be kept open indefinitely. >Plus, I think you'd ideally want an account with each vendor that you deal with, not just one account, otherwise I think the channel would probably need to be managed by some central authority who manages the accounting between you and whoever you're keeping these side accounts with The whole point of lightning is that you can use the network to route money between nodes, so you could make payments even if you don't have a channel open with the person you want to make payments with. It's not unlike how international wires work. If you bank with a local credit union in country A and you want to wire money to another local credit union in country B, the wire might bounce between multiple "correspondent banks" eg. credit union A -> big bank A -> big bank B -> credit union B.

PragmaticPulp 6y ago

> Don't keep it on exchange. The real thing that is stopping adoption... The capital gains tax issue isn't stopping your average person from wanting to use Bitcoin. If we're being honest, how many people would be voluntarily reporting taxes on their Bitcoin purchases anyway? I suspect it would be similar to how many people self-reported the sales tax they owed on out of state online purchases before it was automated: Near zero. The bottom line is that rational consumers like the features and services offered by traditional banks and credit cards. If someone steals your credit card and spends a ton of money, you just call up the credit card company and get your money back. If someone gets access to your Bitcoin wallet and takes all of your Bitcoin, that's it. Game over. Should have had better OPSEC, grandma. Likewise, people don't want to manage wallet passphrases and key files themselves. They want an exchange to handle the details for them, including as much risk as they can move to the exchange. The reality is that Bitcoin is still far and away an inferior experience to traditional payment methods. If I pay with Bitcoin, I have to deal with transaction fees and variable network delays and I have zero recourse if the vendor simply steals my money. With a credit card, the bank literally pays me 1-3% to use their credit card, payment is instant, and I can simply call the bank up and reverse charges if something goes wrong. I don't understand all of these mental gymnastics to explain away Bitcoin's shortcomings for payments.

sunshinerag 6y ago
>> The capital gains tax issue isn't stopping your average person from wanting to use Bitcoin How are you so sure? if I had to report and fill forms for every single transaction that I do, like say buying coffee or video games I would be put off with trying to use the currency. it is a way to cripple it's usage. >> The bottom line is that rational consumers like the features and services offered by traditional banks and credit cards. >> If someone steals your credit card and spends a ton of money, you just call up the credit card company and get your money back. >> If someone gets access to your Bitcoin wallet and takes all of your Bitcoin, that's it. Game over. Should have had better OPSEC, grandma. >> Likewise, people don't want to manage wallet passphrases and key files themselves. They want an exchange to handle the details for them, including as much risk as they can move to the exchange. >> The reality is that Bitcoin is still far and away an inferior experience to traditional payment methods. If I pay with Bitcoin, I have to deal with transaction fees and variable network delays and I have zero recourse if the vendor simply steals my money. With a credit card, the bank literally pays me 1-3% to use their credit card, payment is instant, and I can simply call the bank up and reverse charges if something goes wrong. I completely agree with these points. And I hope the ecosystem improves on these. Still the advantage of Bitcoin's fixed supply and it's ability to hold value vs fiat systems whilst it's capacity to also act as a currency is still something valuable. While it doesn't do everything the way horses (fiat) are now, it will get better as it is the car in the race.

ashtonkem 6y ago

> Don't keep it on exchange. This advice has always made me chuckle. It so profoundly misunderstands how non-techies actually think and operate, that I genuinely wonder how it arose. Exchanges exist and are incredibly popular because they're convenient. If you want to convince people to stop doing something that you think is bad, you need to provide a more convenient alternative, otherwise your advice will be ignored.

BLKNSLVR 6y ago
Or provide the myriad examples of why "Don't keep it on exchange" is good advice[0][1][2]. But it's not up to the advice-giver to do the due diligence. [0]:https://cryptosec.info/exchange-hacks/ https://cryptosec.info/exchange-hacks/ [1]:https://coiniq.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ https://coiniq.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ [2]:https://selfkey.org/list-of-cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/ https://selfkey.org/list-of-cryptocurrency-exchange-hacks/
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  You’re kind of sidestepping my point. Yes, it’s a good idea to keep your coins off the exchange, for all the reasons you’ve provided. The issue is that keeping your money off exchange is far less convenient, which is exactly why most people keep their couns on exchanges despite the risks. If the Bitcoin community in general wants people to stop getting hacked on exchanges, they need to provide more convenient alternatives rather than just continuing to say “keep your coins off the exchange” and blaming users who get hacked for not following this advice. It’s a bit like recommending that everyone not drive to avoid dying in car crashes. This advice is strictly speaking true; the less you drive the less likely you are to die in a car crash. But it completely ignores why people drive and therefore most people won’t listen. As a society we’ve decided that rather than asking people to not drive, it makes more sense to focus on making driving safer per mile travelled. This is a much more effective strategy at reducing driver deaths.
  - ric2b 6y ago
    If some people like to leave their house unlocked because it's convenient it's not my duty to make them a more convenient door lock, it's quite enough to warn them about the dangers and let them make their own decisions. It's not like using a wallet is hard or inconvenient, it's just an extra step, like reaching for your keys before entering your house. But there can certainly be a business opportunity there, sure.

wpietri 6y ago

Could you give some use examples? As of 2018, Bitcoin still appeared to be basically useless as a day-to-day cash substitute: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/16/nyregion/new-york-today-living-on-bitcoin.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/16/nyregion/new-york-today-l... I guess it's not impossible that things have gotten better. But at least in my neighborhood and in the online merchants I frequent, Bitcoin adoption has declined. I think the last time I saw a Bitcoin logo on the street was August 2019. I'd also be interested in statistics demonstrating that the consumer transaction volume is now nontrivial. Last I looked, M-Pesa had orders of more magnitude in use despite launching around the same time as Bitcoin.

Someone 6y ago

That a German seller doesn’t charge VAT does not imply that you do not have to pay VAT. You may have to inform your tax office about the purchase, after which it will send you an invoice for VAT (happens for ‘normal’ bank transactions, too.) https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/taxation/vat/vat-rules-rates/index_en.htm https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/taxation/vat/vat-rules...: “For EU-based companies, VAT is chargeable on most sales and purchases of goods within the EU. In such cases, VAT is charged and due in the EU country where the goods are consumed by the final consumer. Likewise, VAT is charged on services at the time they are carried out in each EU country. VAT isn't charged on exports of goods to countries outside the EU. In these cases, VAT is charged and due in the country of import”

masswerk 6y ago
It's called "reverse charge". If there is a general tax agreement between your country and the EU, no VAT becomes due at the country of origin (of goods and/or services), but you are supposed to declare the purchase locally and pay local VAT, if applicable. There's also usually a marginal sum, below wich goods and services are free of charge (the sum of it, which includes any postage), about EUR 20. (Mind that this mechanism requires tax or VAT IDs on both sides of the transactions, which are to be declared.)

steeve 6y ago

Serious question: Bitcoin being subject to deflation, why would you spend it? Sort of like the $82 million pizzas [1] 1. https://qz.com/1285209/bitcoin-pizza-day-2018-eight-years-ago-someone-bought-two-pizzas-with-bitcoins-now-worth-82-million/ https://qz.com/1285209/bitcoin-pizza-day-2018-eight-years-ag...

cyphertruck 6y ago
Bitcoin is inflating, and will for 130 more years, though it is seeing increased adoption and is riding in price. But in answer to your question,I’m glad you picked food fir your example— would you starve to hold onto your bitcoin? Is your computer ten years old because next year better ones will come out? Or did you bite the bullet and upgrade because your time preference made it worthwhile? It is true, deflation encourages savings, but that is the essence of capitalism, savings keeps people better able to avoid poverty in the event of a bad year, and capital accumulation makes you more able to do a startup and retain control. Part of the reason there is so much VC money is inflation (VCs get new dollars cheap and carry trade through startups)with a hard currency like bitcoin the fotmula would be reversed, and founders would retain more ownership.
Kiro 6y ago
That's $300 million today, which illustrates your point further.

NicoJuicy 6y ago

> 2017 period when fees were high Current fees are 8$. That's still too high