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Coinbase Leads Charge In Bitcoin’s Consumerization

61 points by dsugarman 13y ago

nbashaw 13y ago
Awesome to hear! Congrats to Brian and Fred
seanponeil 13y ago
It's too bad that Coinbase is one of the harder exchanges to work with. Coinbase consistently cancel transactions right before they are supposed to go through because they "appear to be high risk". I loved Coinbase when I first used it, but Bitinstant -> Mt Gox is far more reliable.
- jstrate 13y ago
  I've had this problem and have stopped using them. Since then I've been using localbitcoins and that's been fine. It's surprising to me that after $5 million in investment they are unable to figure out transactions.
rdl 13y ago
Being able to link your bank account is a big deal; everyone wins if Bitcoin becomes more "a currency you buy to buy stuff" vs. just something your speculatively hoard -- including hoarders, ironically.
- TylerE 13y ago
  How does that really work though? If you're arguing for BitCoin to become the next PayPal, in what way is it not a worse PayPal? (Fees for senders, confirmation delays, no fraud protection, etc)
  - rdl 13y ago
    There are probably ways for "wallet providers" to retrofit much of the problems with base bitcoin, including the ones you mention.
    - TylerE 13y ago
      But then it's not Bitcoin. It's another fucking dodgy 3rd party payment provider.
      - ok_craig 13y ago
        Point is you always have the option of sending the old fashioned way if you want. You don't have to use a 3rd party unless there's a specific function they provide for certain specific cases that you want. You don't have that option with regular money. You have to use some service to transfer money for you.
      - VMG 13y ago
        You can't have fraud protection without a 3rd party.
        TylerE 13y ago
        Of course, but 3rd parties are not all the same. Bitcoin 3rd parties have historically been incredibly untrustworthy.
  - jlgreco 13y ago
    How about not having your wallet locked because you failed to notify paypal that you were going to receive large amounts of money in the near future? Bitcoin gives you flexibility that PayPal doesn't. You can't opt-out of protections that PayPal gives you in order to streamline your process; you either use PayPal or you don't. Bitcoin allows you to potentially chose any number of companies to provide services to you, or just roll your own solution.
  - bernatfp 13y ago
    The main problem I see with BTC as compared to PayPal is that transactions can't be cancelled, as they are added into the blockchain.
    - codesuela 13y ago
      You consider it a problem others see it as a feature
  - reedlaw 13y ago
    Bitcoin transaction fees are a tiny fraction of the amount of fees PayPal charges. Confirmation takes about an hour and there is no possibility of chargebacks. As far as fraud protection, if you purchase groceries with cash what kind of protection do you have? Hopefully the reputation and integrity of the seller is enough in most cases. If you can't trust someone, use an escrow service (which still costs less than PayPal fees).
RKearney 13y ago
I can't see myself using Coinbase after hearing they had directory indexing on the directory with all the payment confirmations. Others may see past this, but for me it's an unforgivable mistake on their part.
- isaacwaller 13y ago
  They weren't payment confirmations - they were public merchant checkout pages that were linked from other pages on the internet. http://blog.coinbase.com/post/47198421272/data-on-merchant-pages http://blog.coinbase.com/post/47198421272/data-on-merchant-p...
ksec 13y ago
I still could not get my head around, what happens when Coinbase are hacked and i have no way to trace back the money i lose.
thezach 13y ago
Bitcoin is going to go up in flames, and all these people buying worthless bits are going to be out quite a bit of money. And many will laugh, because we all told you so.
ValentineC 13y ago
I tried adding a Coinbase button to one of my sites a few days ago, but it took ages to load the JavaScript button. Maybe one of their next moves should be finding a fast CDN for such stuff.
joezydeco 13y ago
We just saw the US Government shut down the Dwolla to MtGox link. What's keeping Coinbase from having the same problem here? Is Coinbase doing more proper reporting under PATRIOT rules and etc?

61 points by dsugarman 13y ago

Awesome to hear! Congrats to Brian and Fred

It's too bad that Coinbase is one of the harder exchanges to work with. Coinbase consistently cancel transactions right before they are supposed to go through because they "appear to be high risk". I loved Coinbase when I first used it, but Bitinstant -> Mt Gox is far more reliable.

jstrate 13y ago
I've had this problem and have stopped using them. Since then I've been using localbitcoins and that's been fine. It's surprising to me that after $5 million in investment they are unable to figure out transactions.

rdl 13y ago

Being able to link your bank account is a big deal; everyone wins if Bitcoin becomes more "a currency you buy to buy stuff" vs. just something your speculatively hoard -- including hoarders, ironically.

TylerE 13y ago
How does that really work though? If you're arguing for BitCoin to become the next PayPal, in what way is it not a worse PayPal? (Fees for senders, confirmation delays, no fraud protection, etc)
- rdl 13y ago
  There are probably ways for "wallet providers" to retrofit much of the problems with base bitcoin, including the ones you mention.
  - TylerE 13y ago
    But then it's not Bitcoin. It's another fucking dodgy 3rd party payment provider.
    - ok_craig 13y ago
      Point is you always have the option of sending the old fashioned way if you want. You don't have to use a 3rd party unless there's a specific function they provide for certain specific cases that you want. You don't have that option with regular money. You have to use some service to transfer money for you.
    - VMG 13y ago
      You can't have fraud protection without a 3rd party.
      - TylerE 13y ago
        Of course, but 3rd parties are not all the same. Bitcoin 3rd parties have historically been incredibly untrustworthy.
- jlgreco 13y ago
  How about not having your wallet locked because you failed to notify paypal that you were going to receive large amounts of money in the near future? Bitcoin gives you flexibility that PayPal doesn't. You can't opt-out of protections that PayPal gives you in order to streamline your process; you either use PayPal or you don't. Bitcoin allows you to potentially chose any number of companies to provide services to you, or just roll your own solution.
- bernatfp 13y ago
  The main problem I see with BTC as compared to PayPal is that transactions can't be cancelled, as they are added into the blockchain.
  - codesuela 13y ago
    You consider it a problem others see it as a feature
- reedlaw 13y ago
  Bitcoin transaction fees are a tiny fraction of the amount of fees PayPal charges. Confirmation takes about an hour and there is no possibility of chargebacks. As far as fraud protection, if you purchase groceries with cash what kind of protection do you have? Hopefully the reputation and integrity of the seller is enough in most cases. If you can't trust someone, use an escrow service (which still costs less than PayPal fees).

RKearney 13y ago

I can't see myself using Coinbase after hearing they had directory indexing on the directory with all the payment confirmations. Others may see past this, but for me it's an unforgivable mistake on their part.

isaacwaller 13y ago
They weren't payment confirmations - they were public merchant checkout pages that were linked from other pages on the internet. http://blog.coinbase.com/post/47198421272/data-on-merchant-pages http://blog.coinbase.com/post/47198421272/data-on-merchant-p...

ksec 13y ago

I still could not get my head around, what happens when Coinbase are hacked and i have no way to trace back the money i lose.

thezach 13y ago

Bitcoin is going to go up in flames, and all these people buying worthless bits are going to be out quite a bit of money. And many will laugh, because we all told you so.

ValentineC 13y ago

I tried adding a Coinbase button to one of my sites a few days ago, but it took ages to load the JavaScript button. Maybe one of their next moves should be finding a fast CDN for such stuff.

joezydeco 13y ago

We just saw the US Government shut down the Dwolla to MtGox link. What's keeping Coinbase from having the same problem here? Is Coinbase doing more proper reporting under PATRIOT rules and etc?